The Next Gen (or Gen-7) car has been the subject of countless debates in recent weeks, all focusing on its weaknesses. Road courses and short tracks seem duller than ever before, dirty air is extremely difficult to overcome, and the drivers feel stuck wherever they are running on the track. For example, at Iowa Speedway, the race leader clearly struggled to lap the back of the field.
Denny Hamlin has been one of the car's loudest critics, voicing his frustrations on his weekly podcast, Actions Detrimental.
On the other side of that, Kyle Petty took a different approach than most this week when he chose to defend the car. He said that it is “years ahead” of the “antiquated” cars of the sport's past, and while admitting it's not a true stock car, he asserted that it is still a "NASCAR."
More from Petty: "Everybody wants to point their finger and say 'it's the Next Gen's fault.' It's not the next gen's fault. There's a lot of issues, and not only the car. You guys listen because the drivers complain, and rightfully so, but at the same time, they're still putting on racing every Sunday. And they're putting on some dang good racing every Sunday, if you ask me. There's been some close finishes. There's been some great racing towards the end of the race with the green-white-checkered and the Next Gen car. I know that's hard to believe, as bad as you guys say it is. But at the same time, we're moving forward. If you guys want to go back 1964, 1982, 1999 -- go back. But this sport is moving forward."
Not much disparity between the fastest cars and the slowest cars
Hamlin responded to Petty this weekend at Richmond, taking a nuanced approach to the debate.
“He is right in that sense," said Hamlin. "It is not a stock car. definitely heard him talk about how we used to bring a car off the street and turn it into a racecar – those days have obviously been gone for decades now. He is definitely partially right.
"The difference is that to address – we’ve had exciting moments in this car, and I don’t disagree with that. The issue is that it happened early in the Next Gen era, where there was so much disparity between the fast cars and the slower cars. Now, everyone over time, since there has been no development for years and years now, nothing has really changed – the field has just tightened up. You can see it from the fastest to the slowest. The first time here in the Next Gen was on average lap time seven tenths or something in that range, and last time we came here, it was three and a half.
"The field is just now running the same speed, and at a track where you have to have three to three and a half tenths of speed to overtake the car in front of you, that means that the first-place fastest car is going to struggle to pass the 25th if he just gets put behind him. That is the fundamental part that is going to be tough for us to overcome."
Goodyear's role in improving the on-track product
If the car isn't going to change, then one of the only ways to combat this would be with the tire. Goodyear has been working on that, bringing a high-wear tire to Richmond Raceway after a race at Iowa where there wasn't much tire falloff.
"They are coming here with a more aggressive tire," continued Hamlin. "You have to applaud that. They are willing to do it, and it came from trying it last year, but beyond that, you have to fix the attitude – I’ve said it a million times on my podcast – you have to get rid of the underbody downforce and put it on the over body so you have the ability, like you do in the Xfinity Series, to drive up behind someone and get them off the bottom. That is when running the same speed will be okay, because you can at least get close to the car in front of you to manipulate them and slow them down, where now the leader has the 100 percent advantage over the second-place car. Xfinity is a little more even, a little more 50/50.”
