toyota too good for competition

NASCAR tried to even out the competition in the Nationwide Series on Wednesday by ordering all teams using Toyota motors to squeeze down their horsepower before this weekend's race in Indianapolis.

Toyota has won 14 of 21 races this season in the Nationwide Series, and all but one of them came in a Camry fielded by Joe Gibbs Racing. The exception was JGR driver Kyle Busch's victory at Charlotte in May in a car fielded by Braun Racing.

NASCAR ordered all the Toyota motors to use a smaller restrictor that will knock down 15 horsepower in the motors.

NASCAR recently sent 10 different motors for testing, and found that David Reutimann's Toyota was the best with an estimated 3 percent horsepower advantage over the competition. JGR's No. 18 car ? which Busch drove to victory at Chicago right before the motors were tested ? was second.

Roush Fenway Racing's Nos. 16 and 17 Fords were next, followed by JGR's No. 20 car, which has won nine races with four different drivers this season.

JGR builds its own motors for its two Nationwide Series cars. The rest of the Toyota engines in that series and the Craftsman Truck Series come from Triad Racing Development, a Bill Davis-owned company that leases engines.

Toyota president Lee White did not immediately return a call for comment.

Technically, the new guidelines aren't directed solely at Toyota. But because the automaker is working with a brand new engine and has access to the latest technology, Toyota teams have gained an advantage over the manufacturers using older engine models.

If the other manufacturers should reach the stage Toyota is currently at, they would be subject to the horsepower guidelines NASCAR mandated Wednesday.

Chevrolet has been pushing to use its new engine in the Nationwide Series, and many believe that model is on par with the Toyota motors.

Reply to
badgolferman
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NSCAR is just one big joke as far as I am concerned. While it might not be as scripted as WWE, it is close - less "fixed" than WWE, more "fixed" than the NBA.

Reply to
C. E. White

Why doesn't stock car racing go back to requiring stock bodies and eliminate all restrictions on power not related to safety (the body styles would pretty much determine the latter)? Then if car makers want to win, they'll have to come out with bodies resembling the old Dodge Charger Daytona.

Reply to
larry moe 'n curly

If they released power restrictions the cars would do 220-230 and at those speeds the tracks would be dangerous, they just were not designed for super high speed. Restriction also make it a competition.

Reply to
ransley

Yeah, because ford and chevy can't keep up.... Same thing happened when chrysler outperformed them years ago, remember?

Reply to
Gary L. Burnore

There has been crying by one or another "group"about: noses too aerodynamic, hoods too wide, hood too narrow, back windows too sloped, back windows to steep, wings to wide or high or deep. Its been a constant cry for "fairness" and still more crying cause someones engine is too good - not that the other person's engine is inferior for some reason. So lets "restrict" the better one so the others can have a reason to not improve.

Does this sound sort of like political crying also? Lets not improve the poor performers, lets restrict the better ones.

Ron in Ca (and yes, still lot of smoke up here)

Reply to
ron

If they released power restrictions the cars would do 220-230 and at those speeds the tracks would be dangerous, they just were not designed for super high speed. Restriction also make it a competition.

Well suppose they just required domestic "stock" cars instead of purpose built race cars restricted to 1969 technolgy. I don't think you would find many Camrys doing 220-230. I'd guess Dodge Chargers would win all the races (as long as the cars are restricted to domestic sedans).

Ed

Reply to
C. E. White

Are you talking about the FWD race cars that have been converted to RWD?

Reply to
Mike hunt

Well except they are restricting the other competitors from improving their engines. Toyota is the newest boy on the block. Toyota took all the best ideas from the other competitor's race engines and are getting a little more power with their design. Ford, Chevrolet, and Dodge have all asked to revise their engines and NASCAR has so far said no. NASCAR has some of the most restrictive rules of any automobile racing series. Basically you cannot make any changes without the approval of NASCAR. NASCAR approved Toyota's engine and now that it turns out to be better than the older engines, they are trying to make up for their (NASCAR's) mistake. And don't fool yourself, the Toyota NASCAR engine has absolutely noting to do with any production Toyota engine (same is true for all the others, with Chevrolets being the most closely related to a current production engine, and Toyota having the least relationship to a production engine).

Ed

Reply to
C. E. White

No, he is talking about NASCAR Sprint Cup Racing Cars and Nationwide Series Racing Cars. These are purpose built race cars with purpose built racing engines. All the manufacturers that participate are restricted to using late

1960's technology (with a few concessions to the 21st century like electronic ignition). The only thing a NASCAR racing car has in common with the street car is a name.

Ed

Reply to
C. E. White

I just got to wonder at why they (NASCAR) approved Toyota's use of modern technology but won't let the others do the same? I mean if Toyota could use all the best ideas from all the other 40-50 year old technolgy, why couldn't the other three? Ron

Reply to
ron

Toyota didn't get to use "modern technology." The engine is still a 2V push rod design, they just learned a little bit more. The biggest difference is the bore spacing. They spaced the bores out a little more than the others (the others are still using bore spacing that were fixed by production engines, even though the engines don't really have anything significant in common with production engines any more).

The other three manufacturers would certainly update their designs if NASCAR would let them. NASCAR has to approve any components and they do their very best to keep any manufacturer from getting an unplanned advantage. Since Toyota was the newest manufacturer on the block, there was nothing "old" for NASCAR to restrict Toyota to using. I am sure NASCAR only intended to allow Toyota to have parity with the other manufacturers (well they may have intended to give them just a little advantage to make sure they were competitive initially). Apparently after a year of tuning Toyota was able to get more out of their engines than NASCAR expected. Of course, like the WWE, NASCAR is all about the money, so it may be that Toyota is sponsoring a lot of races at the ISC tracks, and therefore NASCAR (which is for all practical purposes a division of ISC) looks favorably on Toyota. Many "fans" have always suspected NASCAR adjusts the rules for certain teams / brands / drivers. For sure they often revise the rules to keep races from turning into parades. And then there is the whole use of the yellow flag...

Oh well enough. Like I said before, NASCAR is somewhere between the WWE and the NBA when it comes to real, fair, unscripted, competition.

Ed

Reply to
C. E. White

How do you know nothing was done to help them? Even last year other teams claimed the Toyota engines had more power. Roush spent the whole year whining about Toyota getting an unfair advantage in the engine design and lobbied NASCAR hard to let the Ford teams introduce a new cylinder head to close the gap. Chevrolet has been trying to get a new cylinder head approved for two years. The biggest thing holding Toyota back last year was the quality of the teams running Toyotas. This year the difference is a front line team is running Toyotas. For the most part the other Toyota teams are just as pitiful as they were last year. 12 of 13 Toyota wins in the Nationwide Series were won by Gibbs team cars. Kyle Bush is a Gibbs team driver. Waltrip racing, Red Bull Racing, and the other non-Gibbs Toyota teams are still just mid-pack performers for the most part.

Ed

Reply to
C. E. White

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