During a competition briefing on Tuesday at its R&D Centre in Concord, North Carolina, NASCAR unveiled some tweaks to its qualifying procedures for Cup Series races.
The change will affect all races except those on superspeedways since group qualifying isn’t used at those tracks.
At all others, all entries will still be split into two groups for qualifying, with the fastest five drivers from each group advancing to the final round. Those 10 cars will then compete for the pole. How those 10 cars finish in the final round will set the first 10 positions on the track for the race.
However, as far as positions 11-40, cars that do not advance from Group A will determine the outside row for starting positions 11-40 (fastest to slowest), while the remaining cars from Group B will determine the inside row.
Previously, the cars that finished outside the top five in the two groups were seeded 11-40 based on their fastest qualifying lap regardless of which group they came from.
Cup series managing director Brad Moran said the change came after consulting teams and drivers with the goal of hoping to eliminate or reduce any advantage received by drivers being in a particular group as track conditions change.
Group assignments will continue to be determined by performance metrics, which consider fastest lap time position, driver’s final race finish position, owner’s final race finish position and owner points position.
Source: Autosport