NASCAR’s Elton Sawyer defends Next Gen car amid criticism after Bristol

NASCAR senior vice president of competition Elton Sawyer said Tuesday they will “continue to look at our short track package” after Sunday’s race at Bristol was widely panned by fans. Sawyer remains confident in the Next Gen car and believes it’s produced quality racing at all different types of racetracks.

“If you look at our product that we put on the racetrack, we’re constantly looking at that and what we can do to improve it,” Sawyer said on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio. “I don’t want our fans to lose sight that we have great racing at our superspeedways. We have great racing at our intermediate tracks. And we have seen great racing at our short tracks and road courses. We will continue to look at our short track package. We’ve worked closely — the industry that is, our drivers, our teams, our NASCAR folks — work closely with the folks at Goodyear and continue to try to get that fall-off that we’re looking for on the short tracks.

“We’re not going to sleep on this. We’re going to go to work and continue to see what adjustments and changes needs to be made. I think that’s a real credit to the industry. Over 77 years of NASCAR racing and that’s how long we’ve been in business. There’s been an evolution of changes throughout times with the cars if you just go back in different eras. … We’ll continue to look at that and I want our fans to have a voice on that. They can rest assure that are we going to continue to look at that and see what changes that we need to make to continue having the best racing in the world.”

Sunday’s race at Bristol saw the first 200 plus lap run in the stage racing era and the first since Dover in September 2016, per Stephen Stumpf of Frontstretch. Passing was hard to come by. Tire wear was non-existent. Kyle Larson led 411-of-500 laps and cruised to the checkered flag.

Temperature increase flips the script at Bristol

During Saturday’s practice and qualifying session, teams reported issues with tires after about 40 laps. The expectation was that Sunday’s race would be a tire management race. Then came Stage 1 — Larson ran the full 125 laps on one set and dusted the field. Turns out, the warmer temperatures on Sunday made a difference.

NASCAR sprayed down PJ1 on the bottom groove just prior to the race. Sawyer explained why they felt it was necessary.

“The PJ1 was put down Thursday afternoon just due to weather forecast and then as we rolled in on Friday, we had rain all day. Ran the Truck race and could see that the PJ1 was starting to wear. We didn’t spray on Saturday morning and ran the Xfinity race. Had a meeting Sunday morning with the track, Goodyear, some driver input and collectively made the decision to spray again the same footprint we sprayed Thursday night. The goal by spraying the track whether it be at the bottom or the top, you want a one-groove racetrack for some portion of the event because if you don’t spray the bottom, what happens is the top becomes dominant, and nobody can get to the bottom.

“What we’re trying to do is start at the bottom, that starts to wear off and then the cars will start to migrate to the middle of the track and the top groove. We saw that on Saturday. Cars we’re really in multiple grooves. Sunday, most cars were locked to the bottom, but you did see some cars work their way to the top. We’ll continue to learn and again, Bristol has provided some of the best racing in the history of our sport. It’s also given us some opportunities to look at ways we can continue to get better. And that’s what we’ll do.”

NASCAR will continue to work on the on-track product after uneventful Bristol race

NASCAR will continue to look for ways to improve the on-track product. It will be done through a collaboration between teams, broadcast partners and stakeholders.

“You take the input from all of those but ultimately, the people who sit in the stands, the fans that are at home watching the race — they have a loud voice. As well as our broadcast partners and our teams and every stakeholder that has every interest in our sport. We want to get their point of view because what’s best sometimes for the garage area, doesn’t give us the best product on the racetrack and vice versa. So, we have to take that. And NASCAR has to make the final decision on what direction we’re going to go.

“I think the collaboration today is so much better than it’s ever been. And we’ll continue to evolve and continue to do everything we can to take those inputs and make the racing the best we can. Sometimes, those that think, ‘What if you just do this?’ Well, here’s the negative unintended consequences by doing that. ‘Oh, I didn’t know that.’ But that’s why those meetings and collaborations are so good. It gives everybody opportunity to say why this works and why it doesn’t.”