Cup Series drivers locked in for $1 million in-season tournament

The teams competing for the $1 million bonus in NASCAR’s new in-season tournament are now locked in.

Sunday night at Nashville Superspeedway was the last chance to solidify a spot on the grid. Although there are 36 full-time teams on the Cup Series grid, the tournament bracket will only consist of 32.

Brad Keselowski came into the weekend holding down the final spot. He had a 19-point advantage over Shane van Gisbergen. Fortunately for Keselowski, what looked like it could be another rough night after getting collected when Corey Heim cleared himself off of Keselowski’s bumper, the team salvaged a 23rd-place finish. van Gisbergen finished 25th.

The top 32 drivers in points after Nashville and in the tournament:

1.     William Byron

2.     Kyle Larson

3.     Christopher Bell

4.     Denny Hamlin

5.     Chase Elliott

6.     Tyler Reddick

7.     Ryan Blaney

8.     Joey Logano

9.     Ross Chastain

10.  Bubba Wallace

11.  Chase Briscoe

12.  Alex Bowman

13.  Austin Cindric

14.  Chris Buescher

15.  Kyle Busch

16.  Ryan Preece

17.  Carson Hocevar

18.  Ricky Stenhouse Jr.

19.  AJ Allmendinger

20.  Josh Berry

21.  Michael McDowell

22.  John Hunter Nemechek

23.  Todd Gilliland

24.  Erik Jones

25.  Zane Smith

26.  Austin Dillon

27.  Ty Gibbs

28.  Daniel Suarez

29.  Justin Haley

30.  Ty Dillon

31.  Noah Gragson

32.  Brad Keselowski

The drivers who missed the cut were van Gisbergen, Cole Custer, Riley Herbst, and Cody Ware.

It will be a few more weeks before the tournament begins. The next three races at Michigan International Speedway (June 8), Mexico City (June 15), and Pocono Raceway (June 22) will determine bracket seeding. A driver will be seeded by their best finish from those three races.

Atlanta Motor Speedway (June 28) begins the five-race tournament. It is a head-to-head, single elimination format and goes through the Indianapolis Motor Speedway (July 27).