As has been the case for the past few years, NASCAR's top series will open and close the season in the southern state of Florida with events at Daytona and Homestead respectively.
The schedule will get its usual warm-up event with the non-points Shootout at the 2.5-mile venue, followed by the season-opening Daytona 500 on February 26 - the latest date ever for the first race of the year since the 1966 season - as the only points-paying event of the month.
The main adjustments to the schedule have been the dates of the Talladega races, the first moving later in the year from April to May, the second one moving earlier in the autumn as the fourth event of the Chase.
Kansas gets an earlier date for its first race of the year at the end of April instead of June, while Kentucky Speedway will host its second ever Cup event in late June instead of early July. Dover will also have it's first race pushed to early June instead of May.
The Chase will kick off at Chicagoland as this year, while the other nine venues remain exactly the same as the current playoff with the shift in the order of the Talladega event as the only variation.
During the 40-week period between the Shootout and the final race of the year there will only be two breaks, one in April and a second in July, going non-stop for 17 straight weekends from the Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis in the last week of July until the Chase final on November 18.
The All-Star race, the second non-points event of the season, will take place as usual in late May, one week ahead of the season's longest race.
