NASCAR vehicles are (in theory) all exactly the same, that's the point of the sport.
this post was submitted on 10 Jun 2026
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I thought they had to be based on actual shipping vehicles from American car manufacturers. That’s what got me thinking about it. Eventually the EV cars will probably go faster than the combustion engine. The trick will be in getting a charge to last long enough that it doesn’t need more frequent pit stops.
The original concept was "stock cars" but the sport has since evolved.
The trick will be in getting a charge to last long enough that it doesn’t need more frequent pit stops.
That would indeed be quite a trick. The batteries would need to get more energy-dense by more than an order of magnitude compared to the best that are available today. EVs are great for commuting and transportation where vehicle weight isn't as important and you're not constantly trying to go as fast as possible, but they're a very long way from being competitive in that type of racing.
Hot-swappable batteries
Are still significantly slower than NASCAR pit stops, and even if you could get them that fast, you'd also need to make the pit stops more frequently because you'd run out of charge faster than wearing down your tires at those speeds.
I thought they're all the same car with body kits slapped on top
China has battery changing stations, where your depleted battery drops out the bottom of the car into a pit, and a new fully charged one is raised into place.
There are pretty strict restrictions on most aspects of the cars, even as much as to limit top speed for safety through various means, including aerodynamics.
Other than acceleration, I'm not sure that an EV would benefit much against a current NASCAR, unless they can find a way to get more range on a charge than there is with fuel.
And even though this is all pretty hypothetical right now, these racers crash a lot, and between the extra weight and explosiveness of batteries, I wonder if we'll ever see EVs in NASCAR.
EVs aren't more prone to fires or explosions than ICE cars.
Quite a bit less, actually. The fires are just harder to put out.
Yea, I was thinking more that the consequences could be higher in the event of a fire. I figure the weight could possibly lead to more dangerous crashes just due to sheer mass, but maybe not since it's less likely a car would get airborne.
The pointlessness.
Is chess a pointless sport because everyone starts with the same pieces in the same positions every game?
If there was only one move, then yes
Do you think NASCAR drivers aren't thinking? I mean really, this is like saying football is pointless because the field is rectangular and each team is always going towards the opposite team's side to score points.
Because the course is boring and the cars are the same, it's 100% a question of skill and teamwork. Who can outplay whom?
Anyhow I don't especially like watching it, not a motorsports guy in general, but this criticism is not terribly good IMO.
Do you think NASCAR drivers aren't thinking?
haha car go wroom
I've seen the South Park episode :D
My knight turns left. Ok, left again. Left one more time.
The course is not the point, it's a question of how on earth you edge out an advantage against 36+ other drivers in virtually identical cars who are also trying to out plan and out drive you.
I'm not even a NASCAR fan, but this criticism is dumb, sorry.
but this criticism is dumb, sorry.
I mean, yeah, otherwise it's not humorous. Real criticism is serious.
"Stock Car" is in the acronym meaning the cars are supposed to be stock or meaning a car that was close to a regular production vehicle. They are not even close anymore. These things are custom built specialized vehicles. What they should create is NAEVAR. I'd probably watch that.
After looking it up there is something like this already.
https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a61547194/nascar-electric-prototype-details/
Yes, the sport has evolved. But the important part remains that the cars are all built to the same specifications.
Yeah as long as they are all the same I guess it doesn’t matter.
Extreme E was a lot of fun to watch. Also never really had an SUV or Crossover series.
They'll never be allowed to compete head to head. It's like Formula E, that will always be enough different from Formula 1 so as to never show what a pure matchup would look like.
At the current moment in time an F1 car would absolutely destroy any Formula E car. They are so much better in every way that matters for a race car, it isn't even a competition. Formula E cars are pretty cool, but they can't hold a candle to an F1 car. That's why they don't do a pure match up. And that's with the Gen 3 cars, the Gen 2 cars were much worse.
It isn't that it's not allowed, it's that it would be bad for their image. Since they are trying to make money, that's probably not a good idea.
Well, its also that it’s not allowed. Formula E has the monopoly on EV world championship until at least 2048, meaning F1 can’t do that.
Yeah that's true actually
Yeah I'm more thinking about the four wheel drive Gen 4.
Gen 4 is going to be pretty cool for sure.
It will be interesting if an EV even gets into NASCAR since they require V8 engines in a specific size range.
Don't cloud the issue with facts
If Formula one is talking about going back to ICE only a more conservative NASCAR isn't even thinking about switching their main series to electric.
Synthetic fuels will probably be the future of motorsports and likely all ICE vehicles in the future.
Not if you aren't interested in NASCAR.
I thought only naturally aspirated and electric fuel injector motors allowed in Nascar? (Don't ask how I learned this) EVs are kinda fragile with a big 'no stopping the fire' attached to them. Not ideal in those kinda situations :)
That'll depend on how it happens I guess. They could completely rewrite the rules of NASCAR to nerf the petrol-based competition, invent a totally new way of storing electrical energy, or completely rewrite the rules of physics.