Hampton (US), Jun 28 (AP) The debut of NASCAR’s In-Season Challenge in Saturday night’s Cup Series race in Atlanta generated differing opinions and expectations from drivers. After all, there’s a points race to attend to. Every team’s top priority is qualifying for the playoffs and trying to win the championship. Some drivers acknowledge they simply haven’t paid attention to the new race within the race. Also Read | SL vs BAN 2nd Test 2025: Spinners Take Centerstage As Sri Lanka Inch Closer to an Innings Victory Over Bangladesh. Joey Logano says he sees no reason to view the new tournament as a distraction. 鈥淚f there’s something to win, you want to go win it,鈥 Logano said Friday before winning the pole for Saturday night’s race in his Team Penske Ford. Also Read | Vaibhav Suryavanshi Smashes Quickfire 48 As India U19 Registers Comfortable Win Over England U19 in 1st Youth ODI 2025. Denny Hamlin is the No. 1 seed in the 32-driver In-Season Challenge, a five-race, bracket-style tournament. Chase Briscoe, who held off Hamlin for his first win for Joe Gibbs Racing last week at Pocono Raceway, is the No. 2 seed. A USD 1 million prize awaits the winner as part of a new media rights deal that includes TNT. Briscoe said Friday he felt 鈥渄efinitely a sigh of relief, you know, just a weight off your shoulders鈥 following last week’s win. He said that sense of relief was shortlived. 鈥淚’m expected to win multiple races, not just one,鈥 Briscoe said. 鈥淚t’s a sense of relief, but also more pressure because now they know you can win.鈥 NASCAR hopes the tournament generates mid-season interest. The single-elimination format cuts the field to 16 at Chicago, eight at Sonoma, four at Dover and the final two at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Many drivers expect their interest in the tournament will increase after Saturday night’s race. 鈥淚 think some of the drivers have been kind of dismissive over the bracket challenge,鈥 said Brad Keselowski, who enters the race No. 30 in the points standings and in need of a win in Atlanta to earn a playoff spot in his RFK Racing Ford. 鈥淚 think it’ll become a lot more real, whether it be for the drivers or for the media or the fans, as it progresses into the later rounds over the next few weeks,鈥 Keselowski said. Added Ricky Stenhouse, who is 24th in the points race, of the new tournament: 鈥淚t’s cool. I think after this weekend you’ll have a little better idea of what you have. Our main goal in Atlanta is winning and getting into the playoffs.鈥 Team Penske dominates qualifying ====================== Team Penske claimed four of the top five qualifying positions and Ford claimed all of the top five spots. Logano was first at 178.960 mph, tying Josh Berry, who drives for Wood Brothers but has a technical alliance with Team Penske. Ryan Blaney qualified third and Austin Cindric was one spot back for Team Penske, while Ryan Preece, in another Ford for RFK Racing, was fifth. 鈥淚t definitely helps at the start for sure,鈥 Logano said. 鈥淏eing at the front and controlling the race is the thing for sure.鈥 Drawing Uncle’ Noah ============= Briscoe is facing No. 31 seed Noah Gragson in the first bracket. He says it’s a difficult matchup, in part because 鈥渉e’s actually probably my best friend on the circuit 鈥 and my son’s favorite driver.鈥 Briscoe said his 3-year-old son, Brooks, thinks of Gragson 鈥渓ike that uncle that just you take your kid to, and he has Pop-Tarts and ice cream and everything else when he’s with them.鈥 Added Briscoe: 鈥淗opefully I’ll win. If not I’ll never here the end of it from Noah or my son.鈥 Briscoe posted a photo on his X account of his son’s bracket. The photo shows the smiling Brooks holding a bracket with his father’s No. 19 winning every round of the tournament. Racing for Rhealynn ============= Chase Elliott has a special paint scheme on his No. 9 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet that was designed by 11-year-old cancer patient Rhealynn Mills. Elliott chose Mills’ design to highlight his foundation’s efforts to raise money for Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta. Elliott said the 鈥淒esign to Drive鈥 program has raised $500,000 for the children’s hospital. 鈥淭he only bad thing is I feel like we’ve crashed every time we’ve done it,鈥 Elliott said, adding his sponsor, NAPA Auto Parts, deserved credit 鈥渇or giving up the car鈥 so the paint scheme could instead feature Mills’ design. New name for Atlanta track ================== EchoPark Speedway is the new name for the track that was still known as Atlanta Motor Speedway in February when Christopher Bell won while leading only the final lap in overtime. It’s the home track for Elliott, from Dawsonville, Georgia, and he acknowledged seeing the name change and the new green paint 鈥渨as different for me. I think it’s fine.鈥 Odds and ends ========== Ryan Blaney is the favourite (+800) to win the race, per BetMGM Sportsbook. Joey Logano and Austin Cindric, each at +1000, were next. (AP) (This is an unedited and auto-generated story from Syndicated News feed, LatestLY Staff may not have modified or edited the content body)