NASCAR acknowledged on Tuesday that it is having daily conversations about possibly increasing horsepower in the Cup Series cars. Will this be the magic fix for short track racing?
As Ryan Preece explained, the answer is more complicated, but adding horsepower gives him and other Cup drivers options while battling for wins.
"To me, as a race car driver, it just gives you another tool," Preece said in response to a question from AltDriver. "It would certainly benefit my style if we added horsepower because there are things I do with the brake pedal or the throttle or brake bias.
"Another tool on how to help your car exit the corner or when you're setting up a pass being able to clear, having that extra horsepower, but at the end of the day if the rules are the same for everybody, you've just got to figure out how to do it better than everybody else."
Why is increasing horsepower important? One reason is that it takes Cup teams back to old-school racing. They used to take on tracks with cars boasting 900 horsepower. That's a far cry from the 670 used at the majority of ovals in the Gen 7 era.
Preece noted that it also affects the power-to-weight ratio. He mentioned that a lot of short track cars have roughly the same amount of power as Cup cars, but they weigh nearly 1,000 pounds less.
Increasing the power is something that Preece says he wants, but he wants more than an extra 30 or 70 horsepower. He "selfishly" wants much more as a race car driver due to the challenge it presents him and his fellow competitors.
Boosting the power should theoretically improve the on-track product for NASCAR, but it also shouldn't be the sole path forward.
Goodyear can continue to help improve racing on all tracks by continuing to work on the tire. NASCAR can look at different factors such as fuel mileage, stage lengths, and further possible tweaks to the car.
The key is that drivers have a lot of tools to play with and that they aren't all doing the exact same thing in each race. Fans need to see if certain strategies work better than others.
"I'm just gonna use the (Coca-Cola) 600 as an example -- I went back and watched it, and that race was a great race to watch," Preece said. "When I look at North Wilkesboro and how that race was, that was a good race to watch.
"That usually comes from varying strategies. I think it comes from a whole bunch of different things, so if we continue to make adjustments, I think we're definitely gonna keep fans entertained."