- In Charlotte Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Kenneth Bell granted summary judgment to 23XI Racing and Front Row Motorsports in regards to the definition of "premier stock car racing." Effectively, this means that the judge found that NASCAR has control of the market for the top flight of stock car racing and that teams really can't race stock cars anywhere else on a high level.
Jeffrey Kessler, lead counsel for the teams, stated that the ruling stands as a "finding that NASCAR has monopoly power in a properly defined market." Essentially, that means that the trial itself will have a narrowed purpose in order to determine whether NASCAR has used anticompetitive acts to maintain their power.
In their official response, NASCAR stated that the decision was "legally flawed." They plan to address it at the upcoming trial in December.
- Tuesday night saw NASCAR hold their annual Awards Banquet at the JW Marriott Desert Ridge in Phoenix. Here, the champions for all three of NASCAR's National-level Series were
feted. Additional awards were also announced.
FOX NASCAR play-by-play broadcaster Mike Joy earned the NMPA Myers Brothers Award for contributions to the sport. Chase Elliott, Justin Allgaier and Rajah Caruth earned the Most Popular Driver awards in the top-three series respectively.
- Unfortunately for Connor Zilisch, losing out on the NASCAR Xfinity Series championship Saturday cost him a little more than you thought. Failing to win the championship means that he does not have the necessary credentials to participate in this weekend's FIA World Endurance Championship Rookie Test. He was scheduled to drive a Cadillac VSeries.R for Cadillac Hertz Team JOTA.
The annual Rookie Test is scheduled to take place Sunday at the Bahrain International Circuit, the day after the season-ending Bapco Energies 8 Hours of Bahrain.
- Myers Riley Racing announced a partial driver lineup for their Ford Mustang GT3 Tuesday. Felipe Fraga, Sheena Monk and Jenson Altzman will drive the No. 16 Mustang in
2026.
Fraga more or less is a holdover from the past couple of years with Riley Motorsports as he drove the team's LMP2 car alongside Gar Robinson. Robinson has stepped away from sports car racing to go race off-road.
Monk is back in WeatherTech after leaving Triarsi Competizione mid-season. This
will be her fourth season in the series. Altzman raced in the sprint races this year with Gradient Racing in their Ford Mustang GT3.
The team's press release did not note which of the three drivers (if any) would be running the Mustang full-time. Also, a fourth driver for January's Rolex 24 at Daytona will be announced at a later date.
- Corvette Racing by Pratt Miller Motorsports revealed their 2026 driver lineup Tuesday. Antonio Garcia and Alexander Sims will be back in the No. 3 Corvette full-time. They'll be joined by Marvin Kirchhoefer for the three longest endurance races (Daytona, Sebring and Road Atlanta). This will be Kirchhoefer's first time with the team. His only previous time racing the Corvette Z06 GT3.R was in this year's Rolex 24 at Daytona. He was part of the winning
GTD squad at Andrew Wojteczko Autosport along with Orey Fidani, Matt Bell and Lars Kern.
The No. 4 Corvette's driver lineup is unchanged. Nicky Catsburg and Tommy Milner are full-time for another year, while Nico Varrone will join for the longer races.
