NASCAR announced on Monday the creation of the $1 Million Dollar In Season Tournament. Basically, the Denny Hamlin Bracket Challenge is coming to NASCAR for real.
You might recall that Hamlin staged on his own, just as conversation point for his Actions Detrimental podcast, a head-to-head tournament involving races in the middle of summer. It was well received and gave the industry a talking point during the lull of the season beyond the battle over the final couple of playoff spots.
This for real tournament will start next season and will air on the TNT Sports portion of the schedule. The final three races of the Amazon Prime portion of the schedule will determine seeding for the tournament.
“With the launch of our new media rights partnerships in 2025, we were excited to partner with Prime Video and TNT Sports to collaborate on fan engagement concepts that drive story lines in our sport and innovation from a production perspective,” said Brian Herbst, NASCAR SVP, media and productions, in a press release.
“Having head-to-head driver matchups for each one of TNT’s NASCAR Cup Series races will add a compelling fan engagement element across media platforms like TNT, Bleacher Report, House of Highlights and NASCAR digital platforms.”
Basically, the top-32 points earners in the seeding races will then be placed in head-to-head brackets, March Madness style. The No. 1 points earner over the seeding races versus the No. 32. The No. 2 versus the No. 31. So on and so forth.
The highest finishing driver between the two advances over five weeks until there is just one head-to-head match-up remaining for the $1 million prize.
“It’s never been a better time to be a fan of motorsports, and this new first-ever in-season tournament will bring a new competitive dynamic to NASCAR’s summer race weekends,” said Craig Barry, executive vice president and chief content officer, TNT Sports. “TNT Sports has always been at the forefront of creativity and innovation, and NASCAR is a perfect partner to bring this vision to life across our networks and platforms.”
“We’re excited to be part of NASCAR’s first in-season tournament next season,” said Charlie Neiman, head of sports partnerships, Prime Video. “This tournament will showcase the league’s ability to drive innovation and engage fans with increased competition during a key part of the NASCAR schedule.”