NASCAR May Finally Increase Power This Season

NASCAR is seriously considering increasing the power of its Cup Series cars sometime this season.

The seventh generation cars have struggled to put on a good show at short tracks and nothing that’s been tried so far has quite done the trick.

Cup Series cars are currently limited to 670 hp, while previous generation cars made 750 hp and even 900 hp in different seasons.

NASCAR managing director of communications Mike Forde confirmed during this week’s “Hauler Talk” podcast that the move is seriously under consideration.

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“It was something we proactively brought up to have a further discussion of improving the short track package,” Forde said.

“Obviously the drivers all embraced that topic and requested more and more horsepower. So we said, ‘You got it. We’ll look into it.’ We are working with engine builders on that, and we’ll see if this is something that’s put into place this season.”

Denny Hamlin has been advocating the change for the past couple of years and said it could be implemented easily. Increased costs have been cited as the main hurdle.

Kyle Busch, who has made no bones about not being a fan of the seventh generation car, is skeptical that the update will happen, The Tennesseean reported.

“I’ll believe it when I see it,” Busch said.

“The years when we were running 900 horse was pretty bad ass,” Busch said. “The cars were screaming during qualifying. It was a lot of fun to have that sort of power to put yourself to that limit to see how fast you could go.”

The next Cup Series race on a short track isn’t until July 20 at Dover International Speedway.