NASCAR to implement choose rule at road courses beginning at COTA
NASCAR announced Thursday that the “choose rule” will be implemented at all road courses in 2023, beginning with the March 26 event at Circuit of The Americas.
The rule, which allows drivers to pick which lane they prefer to use for an impending restart, was introduced in August 2020 and originally used on all tracks except dirt tracks, superspeedways and road courses.
The sanctioning body announced in a January rules briefing that lane choice would be introduced at superspeedways and dirt tracks this season, which brought the choose procedures to the 2.5-mile Daytona International Speedway for the first time in February.
Thursday’s ruling opens lane choice at each of the six road courses on the 2023 Cup Series schedule, beginning at COTA. Other events include races at Sonoma Raceway, Chicago Street Course, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course, Watkins Glen International and the Charlotte Motor Speedway road course.
Additionally, NASCAR officials have added a 50-minute practice to the COTA weekend schedule, which will be held at 2:05 p.m. ET. This will allow teams to better acclimate to a new rules package for short tracks and road courses in 2023.
The package is set to debut at Phoenix Raceway on Sunday (3:30 p.m. ET, FOX, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
