By AMANDA VINCENT
Rain at Kansas Speedway on Saturday morning led to the cancellation of NASCAR Cup Series qualifying for Sunday’s Hollywood Casino 400, the fourth race of the 2026 Chase. As a result, Joey Logano will start on the pole with Kyle Larson alongside on the front row, based on NASCAR metric that includes results from the previous weekend’s race and the points standings.
“Well, we’re only three races in, which was a round in the past, so we’ll see as it builds deeper into the Chase,” Larson said. “I can definitely see how the pressure just lingers longer. I feel like in the previous format, you would have a lot of pressure, for sure, but then, you would get a reset and a deep breath. There’s no reset or deep breath here, so you have to keep plugging away and really focus on executing good, solid races. I would say it’s been equal pressure to this point and it’s going to continue to build, especially if you’re in the hunt.”
The Kansas weekend marks the third race weekend in recent weeks that Cup Series qualifying has been cancelled. Logano was the race winner last weekend at Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway.
“I’ve got a great team. We’ve got a team that knows how to win championships,” Logano said.
The top-10 of the race starting grid consists mostly of Chase drivers. Josh Berry will be the highest-starting non-Chase driver in 10th.
After an incident with Chase Hocevar a week ago at Bristol, Ryan Blaney will be the worst-starting Chase driver in 25th.
