A NASCAR competition official has said that the sanctioning body is open to ideas after last weekend's Cup Series race at Bristol Motor Speedway sparked criticism.
Elton Sawyer, NASCAR SVP of Competition, addressed the topic during his weekly appearance on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio's "The Morning Drive." He explained that NASCAR will continue to speak with Goodyear, drivers, teams, broadcast partners, and other people in the industry as it continues to address an issue that has plagued the Gen 7 era.
"What I would say is what we talk about every week -- If you look at our product that we put on the racetrack every week, we're constantly looking at that and what we can do to improve it," Sawyer said during his appearance.
"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 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 here at the R&D Center -- work closely with our good friends at Goodyear and continue to work on the tire and try to get that fall-off we're looking for on those short tracks."
Teams entered Sunday's race expecting to see aggressive tire wear, which would force them to manage equipment throughout runs. They expected something similar to last season's spring race which featured 54 lead changes.
This is not what happened. Kyle Larson led 411 laps and swept all three stages in a dominant performance. The race had four lead changes, two of which happened during a green flag pit cycle.
According to Sawyer, NASCAR is "not going to sleep" on this issue. He pointed to the extensive NASCAR history as an example of how this sport has evolved while saying that they will continue to do what they can to deliver the best racing in the world.
Part of this process will be talking to Goodyear and determining how best to deliver the falloff that the drivers and fans want. NASCAR and Goodyear could potentially hold another tire test before the return to Bristol in the fall, but they will make these decisions after an extensive debrief.
Another part of this process will be continued discussions during the regular meetings between NASCAR and its drivers. These conversations cover many topics, including competition and safety.
Sawyer said that the collaboration is better than it has ever been, so if the drivers have ideas to fix the short track racing, they should bring them to the meeting.
"We're all in this together. We all want the same thing," he said. "We want the best product, the best racing on the race track. If someone has an idea, we're all ears."