SOMETIMES a solution creates more problems than fixes.

That’s a harsh reality that needs to be considered in any efforts to bring the Americanised overtime concept to Supercars.

The idea is great on the surface, no doubt.

No spectator wants to watch a draw, if you will. It’s why the NRL brought in golden point, and cricket the super over, and part of what makes penalty shootouts an exciting tiebreaker for soccer.

Of course, a Safety Car finish isn’t exactly the same because there is a winner – just the result is sealed in a neutralised manner.

It’s not what anyone ideally wants to see.

Pic: Supplied/Mark Horsburgh

Overtime mightn’t be quite the silver bullet some crave, however.

The hot topic that is fuel-saving is a key factor, for starters.

Supercars overlords have already been forced to shave laps off race distances in order to see cars make the finish without the need for excessive fuel-saving.

Combine that with the fact that every race other than Bathurst seems to have a time-certain finish – regardless of whether they’re bound by free-to-air broadcast news obligations – and the likelihood is that contests would need to be reduced by two laps in order to build the necessary two-lap overtime contingency window.

So, with 37 races on this year’s calendar, you’re talking about a 74-lap reduction over the course of the season for a 2.3 percent chance that an overtime situation arises (as it did on the Sunday of the Darwin Triple Crown).

That percentage is calculated based on the fact that just eight of the 354 Supercars Championship races since the start of 2015 have finished under Safety Car conditions.

Keep in mind that Safety Car interventions seem to be occurring less and less as mechanical reliability becomes more and more bulletproof.

Also, if overtime were to be activated, what happens if yellow flags come out during that extension phase? Remembering how Safety Cars breed Safety Cars, as the saying goes, and that unlimited overtime probably isn’t an option like in NASCAR (especially given competitors are already cutting it fine on fuel).

Conversely, would it be accepted if overtime turned the Bathurst 1000 into the Bathurst 1012 and potentially changed the result, in the circumstance that the leader on Lap 161 didn’t have enough fuel to do two more laps?

There are enough possible pitfalls to beware of in Supercars’ overtime debate.