Why NASCAR's indecision led to Dodge's decision to return to Cup

Dodge is coming back to the NASCAR Cup Series in 2027 with Kaulig Racing but there are caveats aplenty.

The body has been approved, with an unveil scheduled for the Snowball Derby Super Late race in December, but the engine inside of the car is not expected to be a proprietary Stellantis or MOPAR built platform.

Current reporting suggests AJ Allmendinger and Ty Dillon will drive cars powered by Earnhardt Childress Racing Engines next season.

In some ways, NASCAR was fortunate in that Stellantis was only interested in racing right now using an internal combustion gasoline platform that aligned with the ‘HEMI is Back’ initiative from the manufacturer. 

It wasn’t that long ago that NASCAR was seriously all-in towards electric and hybrid before the culture domestically shifted. Stellantis, Dodge and RAM reflects that shift and NASCAR hadn’t yet jumped into the EV space. 

NASCAR Event Management president John Probst said that wasn’t a selling point to Stellantis but all parties benefited from the timing.

“I’d like to pretend we had some big scheme that made that all look good, but it’s just like a lot of things in life,” Probst said. “Sometimes it’s just timing works out and you’re aligned, and this is the example of that.”

Probst also said that at a minimum, NASCAR will retain its current engine regulations through 2028 but also could extend it through 2030 or 2032.

In other words, there were few reasons for Dodge to build their own engine just to have to do it again in two to five years. So again, the timing just made sense for Dodge.

Probst conceded that they nearly prematurely ended up with an EV platform at the moment the country turned on them. Thus, NASCAR is being thoughtful about what comes next.

“I would say that right now we have started discussions with the OEMs about what does our future look like around the engine,” Probst said. “I would say that we’re targeting anywhere from 2030-to-2032, and that may sound a little wishy-washy, I guess, on the specific date, but as we talk through the OEMs, we’ve already had our first meeting. We’re onto our second meeting here coming up real soon to try and figure out where we want to go as a sport.

“And I think that some of that is looking at the broader landscape around what’s going on in the motor sport world and us, what do we want to do, frankly, around our engine? If you look around the landscape, there’s certainly been a lot of vacillation around how much of the powertrain should be electrified. So, we just want to make sure that we don’t rush into something.

“If we would’ve rushed in a few years ago, we’d add a big hybrid component to the car. And I think that there’s just a lot that goes into it. So I guess it’s a lot of words for probably what could have been a quick answer. 2030 to 2032 is the window we’re looking at.”

With those parameters in mind, Dodge just needed to get a body approved, and Stellantis pushed NASCAR hard to not get shoe boxed into the 2028 timeline the Sanctioning Body felt was most realistic.

It’s still not even completely done yet, thus the unveil in Pensacola, Florida next month.

“So, the process right now is they go in the wind tunnel and they have to fit in the performance box,” Probst said. “They have done that, but those are all on prototype stuff that may or may not fit on an actual race car.

“So the exoskeleton is correct, but a lot of times the mounting of those body panels is a little bit different than how it would be on the race car. Once they pass the wind tunnel test for the exoskeleton, we then kick off the manufacturer of the actual body panels. Then when those body panels come in, we go back into the wind tunnel and just make sure that with the actual production level body panels, they’re still in the box and we’re waiting to do that now. I will say that that is largely a formality.

“We have not had any real instances where an OEM would pass the wind tunnel test and then fail with the production panels. And if they do, we have tools in our arsenal to adjust it to get it back into the box, if you will.”

All told, Probst said it usually takes 18 months to get a body approved, but NASCAR and Dodge worked on an abbreviated schedule to make this happen.

“I think that we’ve done it a little bit more abbreviated because there was a notice of submission of a Dodge, and then it went quiet, and then it picked up a lot of steam very quick, so we’re able to combine a lot of the milestones, but it’s still a year or more process to go through the whole thing,” Probst said.

“So this one came right up against it. Like I said, we’ll have those production panels in, I think, a little under two weeks, so we’ll be done with our season. They’re certainly not going to have a ton of time to prep cars and get ready for Daytona, but this was done about as fast as we can do it once they decided to go.”

At last, NASCAR gets a win after 15 years of promising a new manufacturer joining Ford, Chevrolet and Toyota, and it’s the brand that was the most recent to leave after winning the 2011 championship with Team Penske and Brad Keselowski.

“It feels good from our side because I know we’ve sat in front of this same group for a number of years saying that we are out talking to other OEMs,” Probst said. “There’s a lot of OEM interest in our sport, and I’ve always felt the pressure to try and deliver one. And I think that it’s obviously a big decision for these OEMs to decide to come into our sport. It’s certainly not cheap, but I think that when they look at it nowadays, they see the value in our sport and talking to their customers.

“And again, I point out that the North American car market is probably one of a handful in the world that there’s money to be made on car sales. And I think that when you’re trying to sell cars and trucks and using motor sports as a platform to talk to your fans and your customers, there’s no better place to be than in NASCAR. And with that, we continue to have talks with other OEMs. It’s almost impossible to predict a timeline on other OEMs coming in because again, it’s a big commitment and it takes a bit of time for them to go through the process. And we’ll continue to make our visits around the world for that matter to promote our sport and try and draw new ones in. And that won’t slow down with the announcement tonight.”

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