Condemning A New NASCAR-Mandated Car Has Been Done Before

It’s been well documented that among many teams and competitors, the Next Gen car enforced by NASCAR for 2022 is unsafe and needs to be overhauled, perhaps even replaced, before the 2023 season. I probably don’t have to tell you this, but complaints about cars NASCAR legislated in the past are nothing new — I’m not sure if any one of them received universal acceptance.

But in this case, gripes about the Next Gen car come after several incidents and a few severe injuries that have garnered questions about its safety. For example, there have been numerous failed tire and wheel incidents which have created questions about the effectiveness of the new 18-inch aluminum wheel with the center single lug nut.

However, perhaps the loudest and strongest vocal concerns have come after a series of crashes drivers claimed were more painful because of the car’s solid structure, particularly in the rear. Corey LaJoie, Joey Logano, Martin Truex Jr. and Kevin Harvick, all involved in serious accidents (and in Harvick’s case, fire) have been outspoken with their concerns.

Kurt Busch and Alex Bowman have suffered concussions that have put them out of action — extensively so for Busch.

As you know, just recently Denny Hamlin has expressed the harshest condemnation of the Next Gen car, suggesting it needs a complete redesign. He also questioned the quality of NASCAR’s leadership.

Now, you know as well as I do that any suggestion that NASCAR’s leadership needs an overhaul is almost as old as the sanctioning body itself. And, though it may be for far different reasons and circumstances, any complaint about a NASCAR-mandated car is nothing new at all.

Take the 1981 season, for example.

Before that campaign began, NASCAR decreed that the wheelbase for its Grand National cars be reduced from 110 inches to 105 inches. There were no new wheels and certainly no reduction in the number of lug nuts. No change in rear suspension. No sequential transmission.

None of that stuff, just the loss of five inches on the wheelbase.

But did that little change created a mess.

NASCAR President Bill France Jr. had made it known for years (as far back as 1977) that a change was coming. Detroit was moving steadily to smaller vehicles, and he said the sanctioning body was going to have to do the same. At the end of the 1980 season, NASCAR released a list of cars that would be eligible for 1981. Several new models were included, among them the Mercury Cougar,…