Kevin Harvick has said this all along but he reiterated it on Wednesday in the aftermath of NASCAR CEO Steve O’Donnell dismissing the notion of another new car for the Cup Series in the coming seasons.
Harvick, the 2014 champion and a NASCAR on FOX analyst, says the current car just needs a lot more horsepower and some modifications to the underbody and single source supplier system.
“We don’t need Gen 8 car, but we need Gen 7.5,” Harvick said on his Happy Hour show this week. “You know, we took a lot of swings at it. I think we made some things better for sure but not as much as I think needs to be done.
“You’re going to have to look at the bottom of this race car, right? You’re going to have to look at some of the parts and pieces that you let the teams deal with and mess with. We can talk all day long about ‘the racing was good (on Sunday) at Homestead,’ but it wasn’t as good as Saturday.
“My point is you’re going to have to take a swing at stuff that you don’t want to take a swing at. If you really want to make it better, you’re going to have to change things on the race car you don’t want to change; because they’re probably expensive and you probably have a contract with who’s making the part
“But if you really want to make it better, you’re going to have to make some harder decisions than changing the spoiler (size) and splitter (braces) and things like that.”
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NASCAR is also wrestling with what to do with the future of the O’Reilly and Truck Series, potentially making it more like the current Cup Series car, purely to create an economy where parts and pieces can be created or exchanged throughout the entire industry.
Harvick says the racing on Sunday needs to be more like Saturday so that doesn’t work for him. And really, he just doesn’t want that traditional NASCAR platform on Saturdays to go away.
“I also don’t think changing the O’Reilly platform is the way to go,” Harvick said. “I think we can keep working on
Keep those parts for the cup car. … But just make the trickle down start at O’Reilly’s now and go to Truck and ARCA and Late Models to make all of this right. Cup has to be great. And right now, everything is great on Fridays and Saturdays, great ratings on The CW, so worry about the Cup car. Don’t worry about screwing up the other two. … Leave them alone. If you need to change the body, change the body. Fix the cup car. That’s what you got to concentrate on. And there’s going to be decisions that you’re going to have to make that are going to piss some people off.
“It’s like putting power back in the car. We have been talking about more power. Everyone is like ‘we need some more power’ and they have finally come around to doing a little bit of it. Quit screwing around with putting a little bit in. Put a lot in. Just make it violent and crazy to watch.”
Harvick mentioned Denny Hamlin recently calling the NextGen a ‘Sports Car that wasn’t meant’ for ovals and the 2014 champion agreed.
“I don’t want to be the jerk, but those are the facts,” Harvick said. “And if you really want to take a swing at it, you’re going to have to swing at things that you don’t want to swing at that are going to make some people mad. Engine, bottom of car, structure. It’s going to it’s going to open up a can of worms.
“That’s not going to be a lot of fun to deal with, but you’re going to have to deal with it if you truly want to make it a lot better.”
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