The New Era of NASCAR

A new age has dawned in America's leading motorsport.

For all intents and purposes, the Modern Era of NASCAR, which began in 1972 following the consolidation of the schedule and the retirement of founder “Big” Bill France, has concluded.

The upcoming 2026 NASCAR season, set to begin in 52 days, will mark the start of a New Era.

In recent years, there have been many new and radical changes to NASCAR. Stages, playoffs, the intial charter system. Following the settlement of the lawsuit between 23XI Racing and Front Row Motorsports versus NASCAR, the biggest of them all has come.

Bill France was supposedly the lone founder of NASCAR as a result of the Streamline Hotel meetings that precipitated the birth of it. He wasn’t the only one, at least with what he led many of the meeting participants to believe. But following the inaugural Southern 500 in 1950, NASCAR became by far the leading stock car racing sanctioning body in the country, with France cast as the one great man at the start.

Ever since, the France family has held an iron grip on big league stock car racing in this country. Series came and went, with the most prominent, ARCA, being subservient to NASCAR to the day that it was directly sold to NASCAR.

In 1970, Junior Johnson closed his highly successful race team just a few weeks into the season. A phone call from the company R.J. Reynolds led to a sponsorship offer too good for Johnson to take. Johnson routed the company to the France family for NASCAR sponsorship, immortalizing Johnson forever for having changed the tides of NASCAR in addition to his success as a driver and team owner. His induction into the inaugural class of the NASCAR Hall of Fame, one of just five members, is proof in the pudding.

Much like the Streamline Hotel meetings and the R.J. Reynolds phone call, the formation of this new era of stock car racing will be remembered by one man’s actions. Michael Jordan is one of the greatest athletes in history and parlayed that fame and wealth into NASCAR team ownership.

Although he was joined by others, namely his ownership partner Denny Hamlin and Front Row Motorsport’s Bob Jenkins, it was Jordan’s drive and determination to stand up that led to these changes. His experience as a longtime fan of NASCAR but as a relative outsider to the inner workings of it drove him to push far enough to clinch this change. It’s unlikely Jenkins alone would have been able to get this case settled.

Although details are scant as to the exact terms of the settlement at the time of publication, we know that “evergreen” charters are part of it. These charters cannot be taken away by NASCAR, unlike the current ones. This will fundamentally change how NASCAR will operate for the foreseeable future.

Never before have the Frances had a third party at the table. With the consolidation of track ownership in the 90’s, the only player on the landscape with any real power was Speedway Motorsports Inc., with the cantankerous Bruton Smith and later his son Marcus at the helm. But SMI served similar interests to NASCAR, and once Bruton retired from his affairs, there really wasn’t any potential pushback to whatever NASCAR wanted to do. Until today.

This era begins with NASCAR at the lowest point the company has been in decades, outside of situations involving death. Ratings have fallen dramatically, with many young fans choosing the European-based Formula 1 over the domestic NASCAR offering. Backlash over a lame duck playoff system led to one of the most unsatisfying championship battles in the history of NASCAR.

Team and NASCAR relationship might be at an all-time low, with an ugly court case leading to many private communications becoming public. It got bad enough that Johnny Morris, the founder and CEO of Bass Pro Shops, sent a nasty letter to several publications blasting the Commissioner and his leadership team for their actions. Many of the previously unknown elements of NASCAR’s inner workings, such as how the board of directors operates and how NASCAR spends and earns its money, have become known.

The court case itself was an eight-day circus that is better left unsaid at this rate, with most reports indicating a tired judge and an even more worn-out jury.

But in the darkness, there is a light. After years of fighting it, NASCAR has finally realized that they cannot do it alone anymore. The now infamous “gold codes” would have failed. It’s like trying to mix a beer into a cocktail.

So instead, both NASCAR and the teams have chosen to cooperate. This trial has brought much damage to everybody so far. But the doomsday scenarios did not come to pass.

And now NASCAR and the teams, just three days before the 78th anniversary of those Streamline meetings that would end up consolidating power to one family, will now have to work together to build stock car racing’s future. Time will tell if the only path forwards is up.