“So I would expect that the teams would be absolutely for this.”
NASCAR is expensive. The Next Gen car was designed to level the playing field while also reducing costs and it’s likely that it failed at both of those things but it certainly failed at lowering costs.
The costs of the NASCAR Next Gen racecar
F1 introduced a cost cap on the teams in 2021. It was also designed to level the playing field between the mega teams and the smaller teams.
What’s included in the F1 spending cap? Car R&D, car manufacturing, parts, race operations, garage equipment and most staff wages.
What’s excluded from the cap? F1 driver salaries, the top 3 highest paid staff, marketing, PR and legal. Additionally, engine costs are excluded but those are included in a seperate 190M cap.
That F1 spending cap originally launched at $145M. Today, it sits at $215M. And with the cap, the values of the teams have gone up.
NASCAR is now exploring the idea of a similar cap. On Friday, the NASCAR CEO confirmed he was having those discussions with the team.
Steve O’Donnell addressed the topic in his annual State of the Sport address today. This comes ahead of the championship weekend at Homestead-Miami Speeedway.
NASCAR CEO talks the idea of a spending cap
“It’s a great question. So I would say when I think of a cost cap, not me personally. I think when NASCAR thinks of it, what’s the biggest reason you would do it? The biggest reason you would do it in my opinion would be that team valuation would go up. You’ve seen that, right, with Formula 1,” NASCAR CEO Steve O’Donnell stated of a cost cap.
“So I would expect that the teams would be absolutely for this. If you have interests that are going to come in and evaluate your team of where are you at, having a cost cap is a big deal. But there’s some debate from some of the owners of does this make sense. It’s costly to do that. It’s complicated. We’ve talked to the folks at F1 about how many accountants they have to have at a team to make this happen.”
“But it is true when you look across the pond at F1, it has helped from a team valuation standpoint. I don’t have anything to announce today.”
“I will say it is part of the discussions with the teams. But I would not say that everyone is aligned in terms of it happening. But we have done a ton of work, Scott Prime does we have done a ton of work on what could happen so we could be ready, but nothing imminent.”
Denny Hamlin says it costs $18M to run a NASCAR team
