If you were in charge of NASCAR for a day, what rule changes would you put in place?
Mike Neff: Holy crap, we don’t have that much room in this column. The main rules I would change? The minimum clearance for the front of the car will be 4 inches. The splitter will be removed, and we will go back to a valence. Stage racing stays but there are no stage cautions. The points are awarded, but the race continues. Wheels will have five lug nuts, and tire sidewalls will be 4 inches. There are more, but that would be a good start.
Amy Henderson: Remember the shrimp guy in Forrest Gump? The list went on for days. It’s like that. First, find areas to open up where teams can work more: suspensions, gears, etc. Lose the splitter, raise the cars up and find ways to replace aero grip with mechanical grip. Find a way to create more horsepower — and more importantly, unrestricted horsepower, at least on the non-superspeedways. If that means a smaller engine, so be it. Tires that wear out. Get rid of the stage cautions (keep the points if you want). Lastly (not really, but I could go on all day), give teams real input on the cars and racing packages. I bet if you put guys like Chad Knaus, Paul Wolfe, Cole Pearn and other longtime wrenches in a room, they could fix a lot of things.
Christopher Hansen: You could have a laundry list of changes to the current state of NASCAR, but starting with one of the more obvious is bringing back more horsepower for the NASCAR Cup Series car. More often than not over the past few seasons, we keep seeing comparisons to the current NASCAR Xfinity Series car and how it is more durable than the Next Gen car. Also, bringing back the standard five lug nuts for wheels would help with making loose wheels become a distant memory.
Wyatt Watson: I would get rid of the playoffs and return to a season-long points format to crown a champion. Nothing would make me happier than to return to a points format that rewards consistent finishes and worthy results for a champion. However, I would keep stage racing around but get rid of the stage caution to allow for natural race strategy to play out.
Which Chevrolet Cup team is having the better season so far: Kaulig Racing, Spire Motorsports or Trackhouse Racing?
Jake Altmayer: In terms of raw speed this season, I have to go with Spire, as the team has been consistently bringing fast cars to the racetrack and is frequently contending for top-10 finishes. However, Kaulig has actually improved the most of the Chevrolet teams since last season, as both of its drivers (AJ Allmendinger and Ty Dillon) have been regularly running inside the top 20, with Allmendinger even contending for a playoff spot. While it will likely be an uphill battle to get one of its drivers into the playoffs, so far I’ve been really impressed by the speed that Kaulig has shown in 2025.
Neff: Trackhouse has Ross Chastain, who is doing well in points and running up front, but Daniel Suarez and Shane van Gisbergen have had subpar seasons. Kaulig has been very middling, so it is probably Spire that is having the best season. Carson Hocevar‘s finishes have not been indicative of where he has been running. Michael McDowell has been close to winning a couple of races. Justin Haley hasn’t been at the level of the other two, but every now and then he has a good showing.
Henderson: While Trackhouse has shown speed, it has lacked consistency, and Suarez and van Gisbergen have really struggled. Kaulig hasn’t been able to buy Allmendinger a stroke of luck, and their other driver is Dillon. Spire, meanwhile, has shown growth and is becoming more consistent. It’s the only organization in this trio with two drivers in the top 20 in points. Its drivers are qualifying well. It’s starting to put together complete races, and that is something that has to be learned by doing it. While Trackhouse is still the more likely playoff contender, I absolutely would not be surprised if a Spire car made the cut this year, either on points or a sneaky win. It’s really maximizing its resources right now.
Hansen: Spire. Take Texas Motor Speedway, where two of the three entries qualified inside the top 10 in Hocevar and McDowell, with both running well late until accidents took both out of contention for solid finishes. Hocevar and McDowell both currently sit inside the top 20 in points. Their Spire teammate Haley just had a crew chief change, bringing on former crew chief Ryan Sparks to replace Rodney Childers during the off-week, in what has been to this point an underwhelming start to the season for Haley, with one top-10 finish in 11 races. Chastain has seemingly carried Trackhouse most of this season and is coming off a runner-up finish at Texas, while Suarez and rookie van Gisbergen have had their struggles to start this season, putting them deep in the standings. Meanwhile, Kaulig has shown some good speed from veteran Allmendinger, currently sitting 19th in the overall standings. Even Dillon has been able to put together some solid finishes inside the top 20, including a 12th-place run at Texas last weekend.
Which Richard Childress Racing Xfinity driver would you rather build a Cup team around?
Watson: I would rather build a team around Austin Hill because he has built the experience necessary to enter the Cup Series. If it weren’t for RCR having only two charters and both Austin Dillon and Kyle Busch occupying the two seats, Hill should have already been racing Cup years ago. He is dominant on superspeedways and has occasionally shown speed and a winning car at intermediates and short tracks alike. Hill has been long overdue to make the next step into the Cup Series, and Jesse Love needs to spend a few more seasons in the Xfinity Series before he’s ready for the jump.
Altmayer: While both drivers have a lot of raw talent, I’d have to go with Love. At just 20 years old, Love has shown great speed at virtually every type of track he’s raced at so far, and he also has the consistent results to back it up. Love may not have the same level of experience that Hill does, but given how young he is, he has the most potential of the RCR pairing.
Hansen: When building a dream team, it’s best to have a proven veteran driver with years of experience like Hill has. However, Love has made great strides in his second full time Xfinity season with RCR, with eight top-10 finishes to begin the 2025 season. If I was forming a Cup team but could only take one of those two drivers, I would choose Hill, given his success not only on the drafting-style tracks but also his ability to win at other tracks on the NASCAR schedule like he’s done in Xfinity. For example, winning at Martinsville Speedway this year and on a 1.5-mile track like Las Vegas Motor Speedway in spring 2023.
Which intermediate track produces the best racing in the Cup Series?
Henderson: Homestead-Miami Speedway has had the best racing. Kansas Speedway has had some great finishes. Either one of them is going to put on a show. Homestead deserved to be awarded the finale next year, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see Kansas host it one of these years as well. Darlington Raceway is still The Lady in Black. Charlotte Motor Speedway has been good enough to earn the fall race back on the oval. Las Vegas has had better racing than some of the finishes have shown. Those are my top five, in that order.
Watson: Kansas edges out Charlotte in being the best intermediate track. Kansas has everything you need in a track for the Next Gen car: constant battles throughout the field, comers and goers, multi-groove racing, you name it. To be fair to Charlotte, we only get to watch the oval once a year for the Coca-Cola 600, and last year the race got shortened by rain. There might be some recency bias, especially with last year’s spring race producing the closest finish in NASCAR history, but from race to race in the spring and the fall, Kansas has produced banger-after-banger races.
Neff: Currently, it is Vegas. The asphalt is aged, and the result is tire falloff and multi-groove racing. Homestead is a close second. The variety of racing lines available to the drivers makes for some awesome races. Texas is getting close. The asphalt needs a couple more years of age to get the higher groove to come into play, but the racing is decent. Kansas puts on pretty good races. Atlanta, hopefully, will age and get back to the great track it was. Charlotte’s repave has been incredible in that the surface has not degraded over all of the years since it was repaved.
Altmayer: While you could make a case for most of the intermediate tracks, I have to go with Kansas. Since NASCAR switched to the Next Gen car in 2022, the track has put on consistently great racing, with drivers having multiple lanes to run on its aging surface, allowing for plenty of passing opportunities. Additionally, in the Next Gen era, the track has never scored less than an 80% on Jeff Gluck’s Good Race poll, which reflects the quality of racing we’ve seen at the 1.5-mile speedway.
What is it that Mike Neff doesn’t do? Mike announces several shows each year for the Good Guys Rod and Custom Association. He also pops up everywhere from PRN Pit Reporters and the Press Box with Alan Smothers to SIRIUS XM Radio. He has announced at tracks all over the Southeast, starting at Millbridge Speedway. He's also announced at East Lincoln Speedway, Concord Speedway, Tri-County Speedway, Caraway Speedway, and Charlotte Motor Speedway.
Amy is an 20-year veteran NASCAR writer and a six-time National Motorsports Press Association (NMPA) writing award winner, including first place awards for both columns and race coverage. As well as serving as Photo Editor, Amy writes The Big 6 (Mondays) after every NASCAR Cup Series race. She can also be found working on her bi-weekly columns Holding A Pretty Wheel (Tuesdays) and Only Yesterday (Wednesdays). A New Hampshire native whose heart is in North Carolina, Amy’s work credits have extended everywhere from driver Kenny Wallace’s website to Athlon Sports. She can also be heard weekly as a panelist on the Hard Left Turn podcast that can be found on AccessWDUN.com's Around the Track page.
Wyatt Watson has followed motorsports closely since 2007. He joined Frontstretch as a journalist in February 2023 after serving in the United States Navy for five years as an Electronic Technician Navigation working on submarines. Wyatt is one of Frontstretch's primary IndyCar correspondents, providing exclusive video content on site. He hosts Frontstretch's Through the Gears podcast and occasionally The Pit Straight.You can find Wyatt's written work in columns such as Friday Faceoff and 2-Headed Monsteras well as exclusive IndyCar features. Wyatt also contributes to Frontstretch's social media team, posting unique and engaging content for Frontstretch.
Wyatt Watson can be found on X @WyattWRacing
Jake Altmayer joined the Frontstretch team in 2025, assisting as a news writer and contributing to other weekly columns and articles, such as Friday Faceoff and Xfinity Breakdown. A 2024 graduate of DePaul University, Altmayer has closely followed NASCAR's national series (Cup, Xfinity and Trucks) for nearly a decade and has attended more than a dozen races over the course of that time. In his free time, he enjoys cycling, spending time with his loved ones, and listening to his favorite band, the Beach Boys.