Sawyer: NASCAR 'Not Going to Sleep On' Short Track Woes; Open to Ideas

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“We’re all in this together, and we all want the same thing. We all want the best product and the best racing on the racetrack, and if someone has an idea, we’re all ears.”

That was the message heard Tuesday morning from Elton Sawyer, NASCAR’s Senior Vice President of Competition, who joined The Morning Drive on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio to talk about the on-track product from this past weekend at Bristol Motor Speedway.

Entering the weekend, fans were excited about the prospect of the historic short track in Bristol, Tennessee providing another high-wear race, like we saw last Spring at Bristol. But, when the green dropped on Sunday, the sun was shining on the racetrack, raising the track temperature and eliminating those concerns.

Kyle Larson led 411 of 500 laps in Sunday’s Food City 500, the second straight Bristol event in which the driver of the No. 5 HendrickCars.com Chevrolet has led more than 400 laps en route to the victory.

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While some fans took issue with the absolute romping that Kyle Larson performed on the field Sunday, others took more of an issue to what seemed like a lack of on-track passing throughout the field.

Sawyer says that NASCAR is “not going to sleep on [the short track package]” and doing what it takes to improve it, something that they’re looking at no matter how good or bad an individual race is.

“What I would say is what we talk about every week: If you look at our product that we put on the racetrack every week, we’re constantly looking at that and what we can do to improve,” Sawyer said on Tuesday.

“I don’t want our fans to lose sight that we have great racing and our superspeedways, we have great racing at our intermediate tracks, and we have seen great racing at short tracks and road courses. We will continue to look at our short track package, we’ve worked closely – the industry that is, our drivers, our teams, our NASCAR folks here at the R&D Center, working with our good friends at Goodyear and continue to work on the tire and trying to get that fall-off we’re looking for on those short tracks.”

In recent weeks, some drivers have been quite vocal about the changes they would like to see made to the seventh-generation car and its short track package, including Denny Hamlin, who talked about it at length both on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio and his podcast Actions Detrimental.

Sawyer says that the collaboration between all aspects of the industry is as tight as it has ever been in NASCAR’s 77-year history, and that series officials will continue speaking to drivers, owners, broadcast partners, and other industry stakeholders about what they would like to see in the short track package.

“I think when you take the input from all of them, but ultimately the people that are sitting in the stands and the people that are sitting at home and are watching our product, they have a loud voice, as well as our broadcast partners, and our teams, and every stakeholder that has interest in the sport.

“We get their point-of-view because sometimes what is best for the garage area doesn’t give us the best product on the racetrack and vice versa, so ultimately, we have to take all of that and NASCAR has to make the final decision on what direction we’re going to go, but again I think the collaboration today is so much better than it has ever been.”

Sayer also mentioned that NASCAR will continue to have discussions with Goodyear regarding Bristol Motor Speedway, and what they saw this past weekend and what their plans are moving forwards – in regard to future tire compounds, future tire tests, and other ways that the tire provider can find that precious tire fall-off that everybody is looking for.

Whether or not changes will be implemented in the near-future, is yet to be seen.