NASCAR confirms tires for Darlington as Hamlin predicts 'wild card' race

NASCAR is gearing up for a fascinating race at Darlington this weekend, with Cup Series teams running the 750hp 'short track' package at the track for the first time.

The egg-shaped oval track is notorious for being hard on tires, and drivers are already speaking out about what they expect to be an even tougher race with the increased power.

Darlington is the longest NASCAR track to still be under 1.5 miles, and therefore the longest track where teams will run the short track package in 2026 – with drivers admitting it's going to be 'a handful'.

Adding to the tire-shredding nature of the track will be the weather, with Sunday's temperatures expected to be in the mid-80s.

It was confirmed on Tuesday that teams will have ten fresh sets of tires for the race, with one set of scuffs from qualifying. The left-side tires will be the same as last year's race at the circuit, while the rights will be the intermediate tires which debuted at Kansas in September, and were used at Vegas on the weekend.

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Smith: It's going to be a handful

Rick Heinrich, Goodyear NASCAR product manager, said of the race: “Darlington’s egg-shaped layout and rough track surface give teams a unique challenge. Drivers will have to manage tire wear, and teams will have to be perfect – from race strategy to pit stops – to reach Victory Lane.”

Meanwhile Front Row Motorsports star Zane Smith admitted that sim sessions have pointed to a tricky weekend, with a number of variables.

“I mean, sim is sim and there’s a lot of things that aren’t real," he said. "There’s just so many unknowns. And speaking from a sim standpoint, I mean it’s a massive handful, and I don’t know how the weather looks or whatnot, but man, if it’s gonna be a hot day in Darlington, it’s gonna be a solid day’s work.

I mean, pretty much the short-track package on a really hard mile-and-a-half – and more power? I mean, yeah, it’s pretty easy to think that it’s going to be a handful.”

Denny Hamlin predicted similar things last week on his Actions Detrimental podcast, saying: “It's going to be a small incremental change. Again, the small change, what was the racing truly better this time around? Was it 10% maybe? I mean 15%, but it's something. And so I think you'll see that same change at other racetracks. One thing I will tell you is that heads up on [Darlington], you want to see some cars out of control here in a few weeks."

"These cars with essentially little to no underbody, because we're now going to the short track aerodynamic package for Darlington. These cars are out of control. And so we are going to be…I'm predicting four seconds of fall off. It might be more. It's just the cars with the underbody taken off and that simple diffuser, just even on new tires, just absolutely out of control. So it's going to be a wild card race.”