NASCAR and ARCA Announces New Format for 2020

By Michael Heilman

NASCAR and ARCA jointly announced today that there will be a new championship format beginning in 2020. All three regional series will continue in correlation of a fourth championship all under the ARCA Menards banner.

Under the change, both the NASCAR K&N East and NASCAR K&N West Series will now be known as the ARCA Menards Series East and ARCA Menards Series West. Both of these series will feature a schedule of six to eight races and crowning of separate regional champions. The main ARCA Menards Series will not change and will still have a 20-race schedule that starts February 8th in Daytona.

Not only will there be champions crowned in the ARCA Menards Series, ARCA Menards East, and ARCA Menards West, there will also be a fourth championship known as the ARCA Menards Racing Showdown. This Showdown will feature ten races that will start March 6th at ISM Raceway that will bring together all three series to crown the Showdown champion. The champion of the Showdown will be crowned on September 26th at Memphis Motorsports Park.

“We’re pleased that we’re able to extend our racing sponsorships to include the ARCA Menards Series East and ARCA Menards Series West,” said Menards President & CEO John Menard. “We hope that race fans throughout the country will further enjoy great racing action while also becoming familiar with the Menards brand by shopping at our home improvement stores located in the Midwest or at Menards.com”.

NASCAR Touring Series Managing Director Brandon Thompson commented on this announcement “Both NASCAR and ARCA have worked extremely hard over the last year to provide a rules package and schedule that will serve as the foundation for the preeminent series for racing at this level. It was important for us to move the series forward while creating an environment inclusive for both the current long-term owners and drivers in the series as well as aspiring competitors.”

ARCA President Ron Drager discussed the long history between ARCA and NASCAR saying “What first started as a friendship between Bill France Sr. and John Marcum nearly 70 years ago took a momentous step forward today,” Drager added “The amount of history and tradition these series are bringing together to form four elite championships for drivers is an amazing testament to the strength of this sport.“

Also announced is that the ARCA Menards Series will continue to air on MAVTV with a new extension to broadcast races along with Fox Sports. NBCSN will continue to air the ARCA Menards Series East and West. The full schedule of the ARCA Menards, ARCA Menards Series East and West and the Showdown will all be released at a later date.

#ARCA #Motorsports #NASCARCup