Let’s see a show of hands, who wants the NASCAR Cup Series cars to have more horsepower? We may have some good news for those of you with your hands up in the air, right now.
After an excellent Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway this past Sunday night, Elton Sawyer, NASCAR’s Senior Vice President of Competition, stopped by SiriusXM NASCAR Radio for his weekly availability.
While the Coca-Cola 600 was talked about, the conversation gravitated back to a topic near and dear to the heart of many racing fans — horsepower. Sawyer says the topic came up in a recent meeting with the team owner council.
“It’s on the table. We are working closely with all the stakeholders in the industry, and as I said, the collaboration has been better than ever in our sport, on all topics,” said Elton Sawyer on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio. “This particular one had a team owner council meeting last week, came up, we discussed that.”
Sawyer says that NASCAR has also touched base with engine builders to check how feasible a horsepower increase could be for the NASCAR Cup Series.
“I know John Probst has had a conversation with our engine builders to see what we could do, and how that would look, and what changes would need to be made,” Sawyer explained. “As we talked about before, there’s the efficiencies that come with our rules and regulations that we have today, and if you look at engines and sealed engines, there’s a lot that goes into it and it’s a tall mountain to climb, but we’re willing to do that and give our racefans the best product.”
Obviously, the additional horsepower wouldn’t be granted at tracks such as Daytona, and Talladega, but what tracks would be in the comfort zone for NASCAR to add horsepower at? Sawyer says those talks are still ongoing, but he says that horsepower is a daily conversation at the NASCAR offices, currently.
“So again, behind the scenes right now, there is a lot of conversation going on. How can we do that? Where do we do that? Is it across the board? Obviously, that’s not going to be on superspeedways. It’s just a lot to digest,” Sawyer said. “But, what I will say it is on the forefront, it is on the table, and something that we’re discussing daily.”
You would expect short tracks and road courses, which have suffered from a slumping product since the installation of the Next Gen car in 2022, would be among the tracks being discussed for the potential increased horsepower. But for now, just know that NASCAR is indeed looking at boosting horsepower again in the NASCAR Cup Series after several years of lower totals.
