NASCAR Preview: 75th season one of celebration and transition
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – Kevin Harvick is looking for the exit ramp as he enters his final season as a NASCAR driver while seven-time champion Jimmie Johnson is sliding back into stock cars.
Harvick’s farewell tour will come nine years after his only Cup Series title and ahead of a move into the broadcast booth. Johnson, after two years in IndyCar, has returned to NASCAR as its newest team owner.
Petty Enterprises, an emblem of NASCAR since shortly after the series’ 1948 launch, has rebranded once again and is now Legacy Motor Club. Johnson will sometimes drive for the team he co-owns; this week, for example, he will attempt to qualify for Sunday’s Daytona 500.
This 75th season of NASCAR begins Sunday with the big race and it will be a year of celebration and transition.
Veteran drivers are making room for potential new stars that the public must learn to love. Series leadership is negotiating with its current television partners with the $8.2 billion deal with Fox and NBC set to expire at the end of the 2024 season. NASCAR owners are also demanding a more stable financial model that makes their success less dependent on outside sponsorship.
And then are the frantic changes NASCAR is making to protect its drivers in the second year of the Next Gen car. The rear of the car proved too stiff last year and the energy drivers absorbed in routine collisions led to concussions – including one that ended veteran Kurt Busch’s career.
Alterations made during the offseason lacked the desired effect at the preseason Busch Light Clash exhibition at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, where low speed bumping and banging left drivers complaining about the “violence” of the race, including the jarring whiplash effect they felt each time their rear bumper was slammed.
“We think the changes are certainly heading in the right direction, but from an engineering perspective obviously there needs to be more attenuation in the rear of the car to absorb more of the energy,” David Wilson, president of Toyota Racing Development, told The Associated Press.
“There’s no question that that they’ve made a steep change. The first car that gets backed in the wall, everyone’s going to be paying attention, right?” Wilson added. “(One) of the questions is: What impact will it have on the rest of the car, now that they’ve softened up the rear of the car?”