Green, green, green!

NASCAR is back in action this Sunday after its only off week of the season. And for the final 20 races of 2023, all NASCAR Cup Series events will air on NBC or USA Network.

The broadcast team of Dale Earnhardt Jr., Jeff Burton, Steve Letarte and Rick Allen will once again call races, including high-profile clashes at Daytona, Darlington, Bristol, and Talladega before the Championship Race at Phoenix in November. It all kicks off in Music City this weekend as the Cup Series heads to Nashville Superspeedway.

Here’s everything you might have missed so far during the 2023 season, plus a look ahead to the NBC portion of the schedule – with some help from NASCAR on NBC host and writer Nate Ryan:

NASCAR on NBC will feature a wide variety of track types

You won’t be feeling any sort of déjà vu over the next 20 weeks.

The 20 tracks that will host the remaining races are all different. There are four road courses, three drafting superspeedways, three short tracks (less than a mile), one triangle and nine intermediates (ranging from one to two miles).

Nashville qualifies as an intermediate track, but it is truly one-of-a-kind.

“The first ten races on the NASCAR and NBC schedule set up the 10-driver playoff field for the final 10 races,” Ryan said. “And there are just so many X-factor races when you go down that list, starting with Nashville Superspeedway, which has been on the schedule now for three years. But it’s a concrete oval of 1.33 miles. That's unlike what you'll find virtually anywhere else in the Cup schedule.”

After Nashville, the Cup Series will run the first street race in NASCAR’s 75-year history. Using a makeshift course in the streets of Chicago, drivers and teams will be tested with an unknown challenge. Nobody will be able to test at the course, obviously, because NASCAR is still putting the finishing touches on the layout before the July 2 race.

“This track is in the middle of downtown Chicago,” Ryan explained. “It's very much purpose-built, it's temporary. You can't construct a racetrack for people to come check out a few weeks before the race because you have a lot of other things that are happening in downtown Chicago. And you certainly don't want to disrupt the city aside from just on the race weekend itself.

“The primary unknown here for drivers and teams as they go into the Chicago Street Race is they're not going to have any real world experience. There's not going to be any real world data and not just with this track itself, but with this style of racing (on a city street). Again, street racing has never come to the NASCAR premier series before.”

Ryan cited several other races with the potential for chaos before the playoffs begin, all leading up to the final race of the regular season at Daytona on Aug. 26 on NBC.

“Chicago is going to be a precursor for some other races where the outcomes are relatively unpredictable,” Ryan said. “Like the Indy Road Course, Watkins Glen, where traditionally it's really hard to predict a winner because they don't tend to unfold in really traditional ways. I'd put the Atlanta Motor Speedway race, which is on this newly banked, repaved 1.5-mile oval that really races like Daytona and Talladega. I put Atlanta in that category of being an X-factor race. And of course the cut off race for the playoffs is Daytona, and that is always an X-factor race.”

Penalties ‘detract’ from on-track product in 2023

While there have been plenty of exciting moments this season, much of the focus has been off the track.

In the second year of the Next Gen car, teams have started to bend the rules – and NASCAR is taking notice.

“It's year two of the Next Gen and teams are starting to feel more comfortable with this new iteration of the stock car,” Ryan explained. “And so they're trying to push the envelope a little bit more and try to find the gray areas. And NASCAR, understandably and justifiably to its credit, has tried to lay down the law with this car. They’ve said, you know, we're going to be very vigilant in enforcing the rules and not letting anybody get any leeway that we might have allowed in the past.”

First, Hendrick Motorsports and Kaulig Racing were penalized for modifying the hood louvers on their cars before their punishments were successfully appealed. Hendrick was dealt another penalty weeks later for a modified greenhouse area.

Two other Chevy teams were later penalized – Richard Childress Racing in April for an improperly assembled underwing and Legacy Motor Club in June for a modified greenhouse area.

NASCAR delivered the harvest penalty it could legally impose after May’s Coca-Cola 600 when it found a counterfeit part on Chase Briscoe’s car. The Stewart-Haas Racing team was docked 120 points, stripped of 25 playoff points, and crew chief Johnny Klausmeier was suspended for six weeks and fined $250,000.

In total, over $1 million in penalty fines have been collected by NASCAR through the first 16 races of 2023.

“I just worry a little bit sometimes that it overwhelms the narrative of focusing on racing and personalities,” Ryan said. “To me, that is what drives interest in NASCAR. It's the racing on the track and it's the drivers and their personalities on and off the track. And sometimes when you get too caught up in the penalties discussion, I think it detracts from what should be the primary storylines in NASCAR.”

Kyle Busch, William Byron lead top contenders

With all that penalty discussion out of the way, let’s focus on the actual racing.

Kyle Busch and William Byron lead all drivers this season with three wins apiece. Martin Truex Jr. leads the overall points standings, with Byron and Ryan Blaney close behind.

Busch, 38, made the shocking move from the powerhouse of Joe Gibbs Racing to Richard Childress Racing this offseason. Even after restarting with a new team that hasn’t been as successful in recent years, the two-time Cup champion seems better than ever. He won in just his second start with RCR at Fontana, then added victories at Talladega and Gateway.

Kyle Busch has shown that we underestimated the cars that were being built at Richard Childress Racing,” Ryan said. “... The first 16 races, I think it's really resurrected his reputation as a franchise driver and it's really shown that when the cars are right underneath him, he can still deliver at the Hall of Fame, two-time champion level that we've seen him be capable of in the previous 15 years at Joe Gibbs Racing.”

Byron is a completely different story from Busch. The 25-year-old is having his first true breakout season, leading all drivers in laps led (717), average start (9.8) and average running position (9.3).

“William Byron was my outside the box pick to make the Championship 4 last year,” Ryan said. “And I feel good about that this year. He's tied for the series lead in victories with three, with Kyle Busch also having three wins. So William Byron certainly would be high on my list to make the Championship 4.”

Ross Chastain, Chase Elliott fighting different battles

While Busch and Byron have shined in the first 16 races, other drivers have hit roadblocks.

Ross Chastain started the season off strong, jumping out to a 31-point lead in the standings after finishing fifth at Kansas. But since crashing out from the lead with Kyle Larson at Darlington, the Trackhouse Racing driver has scuffled.

Rick Hendrick, Larson’s team owner, called Chastain out for his overly aggressive driving. Justin Marks, co-owner of Trackhouse, even mentioned that he might have to rein in his driver.

“Since Ross Chastain had his run in with Kyle Larson at Darlington, where they both crashed while racing for the lead, Ross Chastain has finished 22nd, 22nd and 10th,” Ryan said. “And I think even more telling than those results is that he hasn't raced toward the front. He spent the first dozen or so races this year consistently being at the front, consistently being in the lead. He led the points for several weeks. Even though Ross Chastain doesn't have a win in more than 40 races now, it certainly seemed like he was on the cusp of getting to victory lane in the first few months of the season.

“The danger here is that Ross Chastain's M.O. is being that rebellious, sort of anti-establishment driver who isn't afraid to race really hard against some of the stars of the series. I think that's put him in really good positions in the past. When you ask him to pull back on that a little bit and temper that a little bit, it does raise the (question) of how much is too much in terms of pulling back the reins.”

Chastain is still firmly in a position to make the playoffs, but another contending driver is facing an uphill battle.

Chase Elliott, the 2020 Cup champion, missed six races early in the season after breaking his leg while snowboarding. Then, he missed another race in June after being suspended for intentionally crashing Denny Hamlin.

Now 84 points below the playoff cut line, Elliott essentially needs to win a race in order to make the postseason. The eighth-year driver has never missed the playoffs in his career.

“It's really taken Chase Elliott out of his rhythm and we've heard him talk about that this year,” Ryan said of Elliott missing seven of the first 16 races. “We heard him talk about that after Gateway, that it's just been really difficult for him to feel as if he's in the groove.”

International stars are trying NASCAR in 2023

There’s been an interesting wrinkle throughout the 2023 season that will continue into NBC’s races.

Several international racing stars – including former champions from Formula One, IMSA and Supercars – have competed in Cup Series races.

It all started last year when Trackhouse introduced “Project 91,” a part-time car designed to bring foreign stars to NASCAR. Former F1 champion Kimi Raikkonen drove one race last year and returned again at Circuit of the Americas in March.

That race at COTA had some additional star power, with another F1 champion Jenson Button driving for Rick Ware Racing and former ISMA champion Jordan Taylor filling in for the injured Elliott.

I'll give Trackhouse Racing a lot of credit,” Ryan said. “They created this Project 91 concept that brought Kimi Raikkonen over last year and Raikkonen, a former F1 champion, clearly enjoyed his time in the car, clearly enjoyed the experience and I think that that perked up the ears of Jenson Button.”

Later this year, two other international drivers will make their Cup debuts. Shane van Gisbergen, in the Project 91 car, will run the Chicago Street Race while Kamui Kobayashi, in a Toyota for Michael Jordan’s 23XI Racing, will drive at the Indianapolis Road Course. Van Gisbergen is an Australian Supercars champion, and Kobayashi is a former F1 driver.

This influx of outside talent is a credit to the Next Gen car design, according to Ryan.

“The Next Gen cars opened up a lot of avenues with the way it's constructed, the way it's kind of almost on a sports car platform. It's a little bit more nimble, it has better braking, better turning. So I think those guys probably can get in this car and feel more comfortable than they would have trying to drive that previous iteration of stock cars.”

How to watch NASCAR at Nashville this weekend

All NASCAR Cup Series coverage this weekend – and for the rest of 2023 – will be on NBC and USA Network. Here’s the schedule for Nashville Superspeedway:

Friday, June 23 (USA and streaming)

• Practice: 6:30 p.m. ET, USA

Saturday, June 24 (USA and streaming)

• Qualifying: 1 p.m. ET, USA

Sunday, June 25 (NBC and streaming)

• Ally 400: 7 p.m. ET, NBC