Alright, so the 98th Oscars have come and gone, and DeathRaceTracking is all caught up with the results! Honestly, I've had a blast this year, and for the first time in 5 years, I actually finished the DeathRace myself! 13th person from the UK to do it - I'm absolutely over the moon!

Whether you're new to the DeathRace or you've been doing this for ages, I really hope you had a great time this year. And if you didn't quite make it to the finish line, don't sweat it - you can still crack on and complete! Did you know that you can spot the folks who wrapped up before the ceremony by the little calendar icon next to their names on the leaderboard?

Oh, and can we just take a moment to appreciate how global this community is?! People from 67 different countries have been logging their film viewings this year, and more than half of those countries have at least one person who crossed the finish line (34 countries have at least 1 completer!)

The 2026 AoDR Deathies ceremony has come and gone, and honestly? It delivered. The Academy of DeathRace handed out its annual community awards in style, and the full updated results are now live for your browsing pleasure over at the official results page. I loved all of your contributions, such a great show - thank you to everyone involved!

For those who want to relive every glorious moment - watch the full ceremony on YouTube or head to deathracetracking.com/race/5?year=2026 to track your progress.

On a personal note which I genuinely did not see coming - I was given the 4th Cedric of the evening, the community award, presented live by the fantastic Jeff & Victoria. I'm not going to pretend I was cool about it. I was not cool about it and may have been ugly crying in the privacy of my front room. Thank you, from the bottom of my nerdy heart, for all the lovely comments. I love being part of this community!

You knew there'd be even more nerdy numbers. Here are some fun stats from the 2026 Oscars race that I think you'll enjoy!

📅 The busiest day of the entire 2026 race was January 23rd, 2026, when a whopping 2,848 films were logged as watched in a single day!

🏁 For those who completed the race, the most popular film to finish on was Arco, which was the final film for 91 participants.

🎬 When it comes to how people have been catching the 2026 Oscars films, here's how the numbers break down:

🏅 Narrowest Rating Curve - Most Consistent Scores: Zootopia 2 - (average rating =3.6) standard deviation of just ≈ 0.603 across 619 ratings. Yeah, pretty much everyone was on the same page with this one . Whether that's a good or bad thing though... well, that's a whole other argument you can take over to Discord and Reddit.

💥 Widest Rating Curve - Most Polarised Scores: Perfectly a Strangeness - (average rating =2.8) standard deviation of ≈ 0.988 across 542 ratings. Almost a full point of spread! This is the film that had some of you writing poetry and others absolutely fuming. A total crowd splitter. I love that the DeathRace makes us see films that generate discussion!

We currently sit at 56 subscribers. I am so grateful (and genuinely couldn't/wouldn't do it without your support!) £12 per year gets you some great perks - and there's still to support the site if you'd like! Thank you all.

The 2026 DeathRace may now be over, but the site will crack on over the next few months: Data entry is still very much in progress, and the next few weeks will be spent pushing the historical records back — all the way to 2000 initially, with the tantalising possibility of reaching 1990 not far behind. Check the roadmap for milestones. Every completed historical race helps fill in the picture, so if you've been meaning to go back and rate some older races - now's a great time.

A heads-up on newsletter frequency: issues will be coming out a little less regularly going forward until the 2027 race picks up. That said, I'm not going anywhere — you'll still find me active on Reddit and Discord as always, and your comments and feedback are very welcome.

I genuinely really appreciate (and need!!!) the support of subscribers and donors to the site. If you enjoy the tools and want to support the site, there are two ways to help:

The Discord and subreddit remain wide open for all your film discussion needs - chat, hot takes, historical debates, all of it welcome. And yes, the ongoing question of whether Timothée Chalamet will ever actually win an Oscar remains one of the great open discussions of our time.

Genuinely: thank you. To everyone who rates, discusses, nominates, and keeps showing up — this site and community exist because of you. The Deathies, the stats, the historical deep dives, all of it. You made it.

A heads-up on newsletter frequency: issues will be coming out a little less regularly going forward until the 2027 race picks up. That said, I'm not going anywhere — you'll still find me active on Reddit and Discord as always, and your comments and feedback are very welcome.

Happy tracking!

Ian (aka SlightAstro), https://DeathRaceTracking.com