1974 was the first year when Richard Petty scored his first win at the Talladega Superspeedway. Back in the day, the high banks of the 2.60-mile track didn’t have spec cars running laps around it. The teams in the garage had the free hands for building a car, but in the Next Gen era, this freedom is replaced by aero-heavy design, a restrictor plate, and a huge spoiler that creates drag on the cars.

You will see all the cars running bumper to bumper in a tight space in a draft. Without the draft, it’s almost impossible for cars to run at high speeds. The only way you can gain track position is by saving fuel in the draft and spending less time on pit road. It might sound like a great strategy call, but this has spoiled superspeedway racing. In the Next Gen era, the likes of Michael McDowell, Ricky Stenhouse Jr., and Austin Cindric have won races, while three-time Daytona 500 winner Denny Hamlin seems out of touch.

Could extra horsepower improve this style of racing at superspeedways? Well, Richard Petty wasn’t sure about this idea, but after the Jack Link’s 500, he didn’t shy away from calling out the Next Gen car.

Richard Petty questions the lack of skill to win a superspeedway race

On a recent Petty Family Racing podcast episode, the King finally said what many longtime fans have been thinking. “Save gas guys, save gas. So everybody’s just riding around. You can go out here and stand on the side of the interstate and watch cars run up and down the road. Basically they were under a caution flag all the time.” Dale Inman didn’t disagree and said, “The cars brought a lot of this on, Richard.” Petty didn’t let the drivers take the blame: “Definitely, it’s not the drivers. The drivers are doing everything they can to get something out of the car. But there’s nothing there.” Inman pushed further, asking Petty, “But what would they have done to been better?”

Petty summed it up that at this point, it was not even about speed or anything to do with ripping the car to the red lines on the speedometer, “Would horsepower help anything? I don’t know. But they got these cars that are so draggy,” he said. The dismay is evident, and for two legends who have shaped the sport with almost unparalleled expertise, their worries speak to a larger reality: NASCAR racing, particularly at superspeedways, may be losing its essence. Although racing has always involved fuel-saving strategies, its prominence in Gen 7, especially at races like Talladega and Daytona, has only grown.  

The problem reached a boiling point in the 2024 Daytona 500. As the field tiptoed through lengthy green-flag runs, fans looked on in shock. Kyle Busch expressed strong dissatisfaction with the fuel-saving tactics employed during the 2024 Daytona 500. He stated, “I felt disgraceful, myself, being a race car driver – wanting to go fast, lead laps and win the Daytona 500, and that was our strategy that we had to employ at the start of the race because everybody was doing it.” Busch called the pace of the race “pathetic,” and he criticized the need for tactics like these that take away from competitive racing.

Over the years, this style of racing has become infamous for wrecks and not the actual racing. Last year, a total of 27 cars piled up during the fall race at Talladega. This was the biggest ‘Big One’ recorded in NASCAR’s history, and if things do not change, there’s a possibility these wrecks become a norm, while racing takes a backseat. The final few laps at tracks like Daytona, Talladega and Atlanta, everyone is anticipating a big wreck, and the root cause of this problem is the Next Gen car.

Apart from on-track racing, Petty also shared his take on Joey Logano’s disqualification after finishing inside the top 5 at Talladega last Sunday.

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Did NASCAR nit-pick on Joey Logano at Talladega?

Most people in the garage had quiet reactions when Joey Logano’s No. 22 Ford was penalized for having a loose spoiler bolt, which violated NASCAR’s single-source components regulations, after the car finished third at Talladega. Not Richard Petty, though. “I’m not taking up for Penske or anything. But they’ve always been pretty straightforward with everything they’ve done. If they did it, they probably didn’t even know they did it,” The King said.

Petty added, “You go back to our deal. If you got caught cheating, they didn’t just fine you—they took your car, your money, and sent you home.” Regarding NASCAR’s stance on cheating and penalties, Richard Petty did say as much. Petty’s car was discovered to have an engine larger than the 358 cubic inch limit and left-side tires mounted on the right side during the 1983 Miller High Life 400 at Charlotte Motor Speedway. Notwithstanding these infractions, Petty was fined $35,000 and docked 104 points by NASCAR, but he was still permitted to keep the victory. 

Something similar happened last year with Austin Dillon when he wrecked Denny Hamlin and Joey Logano to snag a win at Richmond Raceway. Again, NASCAR let him keep the win, but his automatic qualification for the playoffs was cancelled out. So, be it race race-related incident or trying to bend the rule in the garage, NASCAR is going to drop the hammer on the teams if they are found cheating.