“The Court should deny Plaintiffs’ Motion.”
Thus concludes a detailed response from NASCAR lawyers to the court over 23XI Racing and Front Row Motorsports asking for a preliminary injunction in the form of charter protection throughout the duration of its antitrust lawsuit brought forth against the sanctioning body on October 2.
23XI Racing and Front Row Motorsports have argued in previous legal filings that racing without charters next season, as open teams, would meet the necessary factors based on precedence — irreparable harm, likelihood of success on the merits, public interest and favorable balance of the equities.
NASCAR has already responded its intent to compete next season with 32 charters, minus the four charters previously held by the two teams suing the sanctioning body, increasing monies to the teams that signed the 2026 charter extension agreement and to open teams, which will increase from a maximum of four per race to eight.
“Plaintiffs’ requested relief would cause real harm to NASCAR and the 32 Charter holders. Teams must budget for next season, and NASCAR needs to calculate and communicate to teams the prize money available for each race. NASCAR cannot simply reissue 2025 Charters without affecting Charter teams and other stakeholders, especially since Plaintiffs’ refusal to sign the 2025 Charters increased prize amounts for Charter and open teams alike.”
The sanctioning body also revealed that neither 23XI Racing nor Front Row Motorsports have applied to have the additional of a third charter approved. Both teams have already acquired, in principle, a third ownership token each from the shuttering Stewart-Haas Racing.
Charter transactions have to be approved by NASCAR and it remains unclear what would happen to the two charters that would be in limbo.
Denny Hamlin, who co-owns 23XI Racing, addressed that topic over the weekend at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
“No deadlines that I’m aware of, and no, we haven’t spoken to them about it,” Hamlin said. “I think that is kind of more of a conversation that they would have with Stewart-Haas.”
Trackhouse Racing acquired the third charter that was for sale from SHR.
The sanctioning body summarized its entire response to the preliminary injunction request with the following language:
“Plaintiffs’ Motion—an attempt to force NASCAR into a contract on Plaintiffs’ preferred terms—falls far short of meeting the demanding standard required for obtaining a mandatory injunction. The Motion seeks to change the status quo, not maintain it; is about money, not irreparable harm; and fails to show a likelihood of success on the merits. This lawsuit is not about protecting competition; it’s a bid by Plaintiffs to secure more money than they could through arm’s-length negotiations. The Motion should be denied.”
In other words, NASCAR believes that after two years of negotiation, once the sanctioning body issued its final offer, that 23XI Racing and Front Row Motorsports only brought forth antitrust litigation, not on merit, but as a tactic to receive more revenue.
NASCAR called the preliminary injunction motion a ‘masterclass in contradiction.’
It says 23XI Racing and Front Row ‘have denounce(d) the 2025 Charter as anti-competitive’ but also are asking the court ‘to force NASCAR to offer Plaintiffs 2025 charters so they can receive those exact same benefits,’ that they rejected in September.
There’s also the matter of Section 10.3 and Section 10.4 of both charter agreements.
Section 10.3 prevents teams, once they sign the document, from being able to sue NASCAR on antitrust grounds. Section 10.4 provides chartered teams with reciprocal releases.
“Plaintiffs willingly agreed to Section 10.3 when signing or acquiring 2016 Charters, a provision that “release[s] their antitrust rights.” The teams—undeniably sophisticated parties—were represented by counsel in both rounds of negotiations, and the teams secured the same release for themselves in Section 10.4.”
NASCAR says it is effectively hypocritical for the two teams to just now sue on antitrust grounds over a provision that was included in the 2016 charter that both teams participated in, Front Row from Day One and 23XI, which bought two ownership tokens in 2021 and 2022 respectively.
It also claims a statute of limitations on the 2016 charter.
“Plaintiffs also ignore that they agreed to the same release when acquiring 2016 Charters and never objected to it during two years of 2025 Charter negotiations. These contradictions expose Plaintiffs’ motive: to use this Court to extract more money and better contractual terms from NASCAR.”
NASCAR also states, through its representation, that “claiming a contract ‘violates the Sherman Act cannot, as a matter of law, support an injunction requiring [the defendant] to remain involuntarily in a contractual business relationship with [the plaintiff].”
It also argues, through a presumed precedence in Omega World Travel, Inc. v. Trans World Airlines, “a preliminary injunction ‘simply should not issue’ when a plaintiff ‘literally seeks through its antitrust claim to dissolve the very contractual relationship which it seeks to have preserved through preliminary injunction.”
In other words, the Defendants are arguing on multiple grounds that they should not be forced to enter into an agreement with the teams when the teams have made anti-competitive claims about that document — one they didn’t sign in the first place and one they are trying to dissolve.
“Finally, using the Court to force NASCAR into a contract with Plaintiffs is neither equitable nor in the public interest,” NASCAR concluded a bullet point list of reasons why the preliminary injunction should not be granted.
NASCAR has also argued all along this month, and did so again, that should this case reach a judgement in favor of the teams, that will serve as quantifiable relief.
“All of their claimed harm is compensable through money damages should Plaintiffs ultimately prevail; indeed, Plaintiffs implicitly acknowledge this by providing calculations of their potential losses.”
It also claims, citing the teams’ own statements, that they are prepared to race as open teams without charters no matter what.
The teams are asking the court to grant expedited discovery by November 1.
NASCAR’s response to the lawsuit
While part-and-parcel to the preliminary injunction motion, the response from NASCAR also provides insight into part of its defense against the antitrust suit.
“Plaintiffs’ allegations—concerning contractual terms present in the 2016 Charter (such as exclusivity), NASCAR’s 2018 acquisition of ISC, its 2019 acquisition of ARCA, and the 2019 adoption of Next Gen car requirements—are all barred by the four-year statute of limitations applicable to antitrust claims, and laches.”
The provision that charter teams can only compete in NASCAR are ‘common across sports’ and are pro-competitive ‘because they
make the product more appealing for broadcasters, fans, and sponsors that have other entertainment options.’
NASCAR pushed back on the argument that ‘charters only give (teams) a small share of NASCAR’s broadcast rights revenues by providing exact figures from the 2016 and 2025 documents, but those are redacted as per an agreement from both parties earlier in the week.
“Regardless, NASCAR has every right to exercise its ‘business judgment’ to decide whether and how to share its revenues with teams,’ citing its own victory in Kentucky Speedway LLC v. National Association of Stock Car Auto Racing.
“Indeed, the Supreme Court has repeatedly confirmed businesses are generally ‘free to choose the parties with whom they will deal, as well as the prices, terms, and conditions.’”
The two teams have argued in legal filings that the Next Gen car, which has single source suppliers picked by the sanctioning body’ constitutes anticompetitive behavior.
NASCAR cited several cases that it argues ‘courts defer to motorsport sanctioning bodies’ rules, including equipment,’ while also stating that several teams endorsed a spec car as a less prohibitive barrier to competition.
It even cited Denny Hamlin, who once called the Next Gen ‘a net positive for our sport,’ that makes ‘access to’ competition ‘easier.’
“Additionally, Plaintiffs ‘knew from the moment they signed their agreements”’ that NASCAR could impose conditions regarding car parts.”
The two teams cited NASCAR acquiring sister company International Speedway Corp. and the ARCA Racing Series as anti-competitive, in that the league became a monopoly by buying up its competition.
NASCAR responded to that as well.
“Nor do Plaintiffs explain how NASCAR’s acquisitions of ISC or ARCA were anticompetitive. Many acquisitions are procompetitive, particularly when they do not give the defendant any ‘advantage’ it did not already have.
“Here, the France family had owned a controlling percentage of
ISC’s voting stock since it was founded. The 2018 ISC acquisition also
underwent government review. And ARCA — acquired by NASCAR for only (redacted) — was never a potential competitor to NASCAR.”
The Sanctioning Body also argued that NASCAR is not a monopoly, because ‘NASCAR competes with various forms of entertainment, and the
expert failed to analyze all potential substitutes,’ a line that also came from the Kentucky Speedway LLC v NASCAR suit.
It also said NASCAR’s status does not show ‘significant anticompetitive effects within (that market) including suppressed competitor compensation’ — citing the aforementioned redacted revenue increases from the 2016 to 2025 charter documents.