NASCAR is America’s motorsport. Honda is an extremely American company and one of the biggest brands in the United States by sales. Honda, also, is a company with a long and proud motorsports tradition, but it isn’t in NASCAR and this makes no sense to me. Let’s rectify this.
If you look at the biggest brands by sales in the United States you’ll see Toyota at the top, followed by Ford and Chevrolet. Behind the three of them, but quickly catching up, is Honda. It makes sense. Hondas are attractive, affordable, and reliable, and the brand is offering more of the hybrid vehicles that Americans seem to crave these days.
And when I say Honda is “extremely American” I mean literally that. Honda makes about two-thirds of its cars in the United States, which makes it one of the most American carmakers by production. It was also one of the first foreign automakers, and the first Japanese automaker, to build in America after opening up its Marysville, Ohio facility in 1982.
Sure, F1 is making inroads in the U.S. market, but on almost any weekend it isn’t that close to NASCAR in ratings. So pairing this extremely American company with an extremely American sport only seems logical, right?
There are many logical reasons why NASCAR and Honda make sense and I will make those arguments below. Also, I’m a fan of both NASCAR and Honda and it would make me happy, and I think I deserve to be happy. Right Honda? Why do you want to make me sad, American Honda Motor Company? That feels very unHonda.
Argument #1: Honda Is A Motorsports Brand And It’s Weird That Honda Isn’t In NASCAR
I once produced/directed a TV show about motorsports for NBC Sports, and almost every shoot I was on there’d be a Honda in the mix. Not only were Honda vehicles and drivers there, they were also usually out front.
IndyCar? Last year’s champion was Alex Palou, a Honda driver for Chip Ganassi Racing. You probably didn’t know that because you don’t watch IndyCar because, sadly, many people treat IndyCar like they do church, showing up one day a year with everyone else.
The most dominant motorcross/supercross racer in the world is Australian Jett Lawrence, having walked away with the 2022 250cc championship before winning a bunch of the 450cc races last year. His bike? A Honda. The company’s luxury brand Acura won three manufacturer championships in IMSA in the last five years and the Civic Type R has long been competitive in American touring car racing.
Do I need to tell you how good Max Verstappen and his Honda-powered Red Bull car have been? That’s a ‘Honda’ engine besting Mercedes, Ferrari, and Renault.
Honda wins. It’s what the brand does. Everywhere. In its home market of Japan, the company has been a longtime participant in SUPER GT, which is as close to a Japanese equivalent of NASCAR as you’ll find.
With all this excellence, why the hell isn’t Honda in NASCAR? Sure, it’s expensive, but Honda seems fine spending money on IndyCar for a questionable return.
Argument #2: NASCAR Is Extremely Popular
While NASCAR, like most modern sports, is off from its heyday when the only way to watch TV was to glide through the channels on your giant Time Warner Cable box, it’s still proportionally the biggest racing series in the United States.
Here are the most-watched auto racing events in the U.S. by television viewers through the middle of November last year:
With the NASCAR season over, here's an updated list of 2023 Auto Racing events ranked by average number of US Television viewers: pic.twitter.com/lmJcvVYCPY
— nascarman (@nascarman_rr) November 8, 2023
Notice something? With the exception of the Indy 500, you have to get to F1’s Miami broadcast in place #39 before you hit a non-NASCAR event. Hell, an Xfinity race beat all F1 broadcasts last year.
With F1 making a huge push to get (and keep) an American audience, this will likely change a little over time. This weekend marked the first time that an F1 race beat a NASCAR race in ratings, but that required a rain delay that was perfectly timed to let the Miami race slip in between the NASCAR race’s intended start and finish, as well as a basketball lead-in.
Sure, NASCAR viewership isn’t what it was back when SportsCenter was must-watch TV, but already this season multiple races have seen significant year-over-year growth.
Why is this? NASCAR is kinda cool again.
Argument #3: NASCAR Is Cool Again
The sport is offering a better mix of tracks that appeal to both long-time fans and the motorsports-curious. The drivers and team owners are finally starting to be interesting again after the boring, Hendrick-dominated corporate years.
To test this theory I brought a couple of buddies with me to the NASCAR Xfinity race at Dover Motor Speedway earlier this year.
Neither of these dads had ever been to a NASCAR race. Neither of them is what you’d call your traditional NASCAR fan–one is a professor of physics at a college in New York and the other one works for the United Nations.
And yet, they had a great time. It didn’t hurt, of course, that Parker got us VIP passes and we had the chance to sit on the box during a pitstop. The close access was great, but after watching Cup qualifying and the first part of the Xfinity race from inside the track both of them just wanted to sit in the grandstands and feel the cars go around the track.
I drove us up in a bright red Civic Type R and, rather than feel out-of-place, the car felt like it fit right in. I even noticed a few people checking out the CTR. I don’t blame them! It’s finally a great-looking car.
NASCAR’s two most exciting new team owners are Pitbull and freakin’ Micheal Jordan, both of whom have increasingly successful programs with young and interesting drivers like Bubba Wallace and Daniel Suarez. The sport is attracting global talent like Aussie Supercar champ Shane Van Gisbergen, who is running his first full season in the sport.
The sport is becoming, in the words of Pitbull… WORLDWIDE.
Argument #4: NASCAR Needs Honda
The more brands you have represented in a series the healthier it is. That’s just math. Since Dodge bowed out a few years ago, it’s been less than ideal that there are only three manufacturers in NASCAR.
On that basis alone, NASCAR needs Honda, though you could make the same argument for Hyundai joining the sport (which, hey, neat, please do that Hyundai).
I think there’s a bigger reason why the sport would benefit from Honda in particular. NASCAR, like every major motorsport, has a cost problem. It’s expensive. The sport has been trying to make it cheaper and more modern while maintaining the appeal, but it’s still millions of dollars a year to be competitive in the lower-level truck series.
This means a lot of the drivers who end up in the sport are, like F1 drivers, the ones who have the means to do it. There are talented drivers who make it through the sheer force of wheel and ability, but for every Kyle Larson there are probably four rich kids whose parents can sponsor a team.
And that’s fine. Rich kids fuel the sport and have been a part of basically every racing series going back to the Paris-to-Peking Rally at the turn of last century.
Honda could bring with it new money and new energy and help resurrect old teams and, better yet, help form new teams like Pitbull’s Trackhouse, Jordan’s 23XI, and Kaulig Racing. New programs that can give young, talented drivers more room to shine.
Historically, Honda has been a great platform for new talent to enter motorsports and that’s what NASCAR needs more of these days.
Argument #5: I Just Want It To Happen
This isn’t logical, it’s emotional.
It would be cool. A Honda Ridgeline would look great in the truck series, a Honda Civic Type R would look awesome as a loud V8 Xfinity car, and why not toss an Accord (or Integra Type R) in Cup. A modern Cup car looks way more like a Honda Accord than it does a Chevy Camaro.
Toyota already did all the hard work of making sure a Japanese brand would be welcome in NASCAR and, lo and behold, no one seems to care anymore. In the parking lot of the NASCAR race there were plenty of Hondas because many people drive Hondas.
I think Honda would be a welcome addition and, even better, if they start making the cars in one of the series hybrids.
Again, this doesn’t make logical sense, but neither does watching any sport. In theory, all of us should be playing sports on the weekends instead of watching them. That’s not what happens. Instead, we gather with friends and get worked up over someone else doing something we wish we could do.
Why shouldn’t Honda fans have someone to root for on Sundays?
Am I Crazy?
I don’t think I’m crazy. Here’s a tidbit form Adam Stern in Sports Business Journal from earlier this week:
Car companies play outsized roles in racing relative to other sponsors. For example, Toyota was the biggest national TV advertiser during NASCAR races in 2023 at $3.8 million, according to iSpot.tv. NASCAR has been in discussions with Honda to persuade the Japanese giant to become its fourth manufacturer, joining Chevrolet, Toyota and Ford, and Laukes mentioned Hyundai as another brand that could see NASCAR as a viable marketing platform.
Prospective car companies have told NASCAR they will join only if NASCAR can offer a compelling narrative for consumers with hybrid cars or sustainable fuels, according to a person familiar with the matter.
Why not have a hybrid system in the Next Gen cars for getting on and off pit road? It works in IMSA and could make the sport more interesting for fans.
See, I’m not crazy.
A few years ago I read a story about Hyundai taking a meeting with Toyota about getting into NASCAR. Toyota told them it wasn’t paying off as much as they hoped because fans are now more interested in drivers than car make. Toyota said they’re staying in it because they’ve invested a lot of time and money and they don’t want to look like quitters. I’m working on memory here, but I know it’s not a false memory.
My understanding is that Honda removed their branding from their F1 engine program as they wish to project a “greener” image.
A move to Nascar would be like doing an about-face.
Any Idea what a top-flight manufacturer deal in NASCAR would cost? I’m guessing a couple hundred million or more. Half a billion? That’s a lot of R&D foregone.
Counterpoint, Honda is about advanced technology, which they can show off in F1, Moto GP, touring car classes and Superbikes. Honda cannot show off tech in NASCAR which is deliberately restricted to a tech lower than a Speedway motorcycle which can at least have overhead camshafts.
Exactly. Honda engineering a pushrod V-8? I don’t see it. It took Toyota a LONG time to build their program and grow in the sport (remember the V6 Celicas before they entered Cup?) while they developed their engine. That’s why NASCAR wants to do an EV crossover series with the Blazer EV and Mustang Mach E— a Honda Prologue would fit in there as an entry point for them before any future hypothetical hybrid Cup car.
The real lost opportunity was Dodge not getting back into Nascar with the Challenger or Charger. And now that those two Mercedes-sourced chassis were put to rest, that brand new Charger really, truely belongs back in Nascar. It’d be like 1969 all over again. And that’s not a bad thing when it comes to buyer interest come Monday mornings.
I want to see Tesla in NASCAR because that means a Tesla-branded vehicle with a rules-specified V8 under the hood.
Maybe I’m obtuse, but I don’t see the point of anyone being in NASCAR these days.
It made sense back in the day. There was less advertising everywhere you looked, so NASCAR was advertising. Richard Petty would be driving a Plymouth and Joe Six Pack could see that Plymouth and go “man I want one of those”. Joe could go buy that car next week.
Yes, it wasn’t the “same car”, but a “civilian spec” Roadrunner was far closer to the track model than a Camry is to a NASCAR Camry today. Hell same is true for the NASCAR “Camaro” going on the oval.
I’m sure Toyota has MBAs that have decided NASCAR is worth it for advertising, even though you can’t do anything these days without an ad being placed in front of you. I guess Honda’s MBAs must say something different.
My hot take is that it would be boring as shit to watch a bunch of stock cars running around an oval course for two hours. I don’t care that the cars that are racing are not the same ones you can buy – that’s not why I’m watching Nascar.
Interesting point, and I think you’re right – it’s no longer for the advertising; it’s now for the prestige.
In the sense that having “racing” of some sort attached to a brand signals certain things, even if, as you point out, there’s increasingly little overlap between that and what’s on the street.
And thanks to its fairly nation-wide character at this point, NASCAR is probably one of the more cost-effective ways to do that. If it were up to me, it would be “run Trans-Am you guys!”, but I know that won’t get manufacturers much more than “I thought they stopped making those cars!?” from the buying public, so…
Honda should be part of NASCAR.
Been wondering why they are not though for many years.
They certainly have the expertise and tech ability to compete at all levels.
On the other hand I often wonder how Richard Petty feels watching his old team (now owned by Jimmie Johnson), running Toyotas these days.
Life goes on, and it sucks to become old.
You are right Honda does belong in NASCAR. Honda has been in the US what almost 60 years? Ill take it one step further and say that Mercedes Benz and Volkswagen also belongs in NASCAR. I disagree with #2 NASCAR is not at Peak popularity but its on an upswing. I will also add a #6. Honda belongs more than chevy. Honda still produces gas powered cars. Chevrolet is either going electric car or Gas SUV
I’ll just sit here in my corner crying to myself at how great it would be to have a Ford/Chevy/Toyota/Honda Indycar series.
I’m with ya. As a Ford guy, I think Ford is wrong to buy into F1 instead of taking the opportunity to be a real part of IndyCar.
Except on and off Ford have been in F1 since 1967. They have the resources to do it all.
“No one seems to care anymore.”
You can be absolutely assured wide swaths of NASCAR’s core fan base (which do not include the physics professors and UN diplomats with whom Hardibro hangs out at the track) regularly grouse about “them cheatin’ Toyoters”, even almost two decades after Waltrip got busted at the 2007 Daytona 500. The appearance of Honda would make their heads explode.
I don’t disagree Honda should have a horse in the race. But you underestimate the reactions of good ol’ boys (and girls) should it actually happen.
I, myself, personally, am very tired of having to worry about what some hillbilly somewhere will have to say about something.
This story didn’t make any sense until we got to #5. Then it did. It is a fanboi plea.
In that spirit, though… I would suggest this: Honda should enter NASCAR under two conditions. #1 is NASCAR starts to use Indycar engines and #2 they start to race crossovers.
#1 would make NASCAR racing so much better, because NASCAR is now in the same place that Indycar was in when they developed it. They need 3-4 different HP levels for different types of tracks, and adding a hybrid system will make things that more important for the MFGs.
#2 is inevitable, so get ahead of the curve.
By racing crossovers, do you mean racing the exact same cars they race now, but with “Equinox RS” stickers on the sides? Because I can definitely see that happening
There was a very brief moment when Ford sunsetted the Fusion that some of us wondered – will it actually put “Edge” stickers on its Cup Series entry?
“Argument #3: NASCAR Is Cool Again”
No.
Just No.
Which makes me wonder: Now that GM isn’t building Malibus and Camaros anymore – What will the GM teams call their NASCAR entries?
Silverado Coupes?
Chevy Trax?
If Stellantis came back in, they could rotate through all their brands – Alfa Romeo, Chrysler, Dodge, Fiat, Jeep, Maserati…
I mean, it’s all just decal sets on the same tube frame chassis.
I went to the Nascar site and looked at their track list – there’s 42 tracks and the track types are listed as “Short Track”, “Intermediate”, “Superspeedway”, and “Road Course”. Am I wrong or is this “Oval”, “Oval”, “Oval”, and “Resembles a real race track but with potholes”?
Yeah, but its small oval, medium oval, extra large oval
so Grande, Venti, and Tall ovals?
One could boil down anything to be a trite as that. All of these track types are wildly different from each other and require different setups. Super Speedways suck though and will eventually get someone else killed.
Right – and I’m not yucking on anyone else’s yum – I just find oval racing incredibly boring. I recognize that it requires specific skills and that it’s not as simple as just “turning left” – but ultimately that isn’t something I care about. Just going fast all bunched up and having big wrecks, and “rubbing is racing” and all that noise – it really isn’t that exciting to me, kinda like how some folks like baseball and to me it’s like watching paint dry.
That said, I found out that there’s more Road Courses than I was aware – of 42 tracks, there’s 12 that I could potentially check out races for!
Yeah oval racing. Who needs all the drafting and passing and strategy, and stuff actually happening? Being able to see everything? Snooze fest!
Road and street courses. Real racing the winner is determined at qualifying, if you make more than 20 passes for position over the course of a season you get an award! That’s exciting.
You should actually try watching an oval race on either an intermediate, or speedway. Currently the short track package is dull and superspeedways are an acquired taste. Anywhere that’s a mile up to two and you’ll be amazed how much for it can be watching race that doesn’t act as tranquilizer.
Again, different strokes for different folks. Ovals, to me, are as boring as shit. I’m glad that you and many other people can enjoy Nascar though because it definitely seems very approachable as a fan; the tickets seem pretty reasonably priced (especially compared to F1 lol) and with as many tracks as they have, most folks have one sorta near them if they wanna attend.
My dream racing series would be:
based on real, actual cars, like the kind you can buy with money – not stone-age tech with painted-on headlights nor ultra-bespoke, ultra-engineered hypercars like F1 that are cost-comparable with airlinershave a season cap on spend, to encourage privateers as well as manufacturers and well-heeled Red Bull-style teamsrace on well-designed tracks with a solid mix of straights, corners and elevation changes (Laguna Seca, Bathurst, Circuit de la Sarthe), and with both left and right turnsIt bears repeating: be a series based on real, actual cars – complete with a homologation requirement for minimum units manufacturedSo kinda like old WRC – but on racetracks.
Honda has the same number of wins in the top 3 NASCAR series as Ford does this year, so they might as well actually enter a car.
Who says things aren’t getting better?
I love the irony of Nascar being nothing but Japanese brands.
“Welcome Racist Fans!”
This is actually a misconception. NASCAR’s fanbase is actually fairly purple.
The most right-leaning sports fanbase (U.S., at least) is actually college football.
Don’t forget wrasslin’…..
You mean two oiled up guys rubbing themselves together? Mmm. Daddy likes
Shhhhh. We’re trying to pretend here that Nascar never had a racism problem.
I quit the NFL and exclusively follow NASCAR now because I was tired of supporting racists.
People used to laugh at that. It has been a lot of years since I’ve had that response.
Honda is a motor company first and a vehicle (car, plane, motorcycle) company second. I think they’d rather be dead than use someone else’s pushrod V8 in a motorsports entry. The only V8 that Honda makes is a 350hp outboard marine engine. Which could be interesting actually.
Honestly, that would be kinda amazing.
Oddly, that V8 has a bore (89 mm, just like the BF2xx engines and the 3.5 liter J series that they’re based on) and a V angle (60 degrees) that make me suspect they made a stroker 8-cylinder J series, rather than actually make a dedicated V8 family.
However, it’s overhead cam, not pushrod.
Of course, Honda’s made plenty of *racing* V8s, for both Indy and F1. And, then, there’s the time Soichiro Honda clowned on GM by adding CVCC to a Chevy V8…
Only 385,000 of us watched IndyCar Road America last year? Jeez, we could’ve all just went.
Penske absolutely sucks at promoting the series as a whole. Does great with the Indy 500 but outside of that it’s an absolute shitshow imo.
For me, it’s Hyundai, not Honda, for NASCAR.
It seems the perfect fit for the firm right now. Kia is already racing, so for the same reasons Toyota went there back when, Hyundai should take the plunge now.
This is an interesting take, and based on the market share that Hyundai is going after, NASCAR could really help their brand image. I feel like Honda has already proven it’s motorsport prowess, but Hyundai could use some more of the exposure. Where’s N-sane at?
Win on Sunday, sell on Monday, if Honda wants to get serious about moving more of those RWD V8 Accord coupes piling up on dealer lots, I dont see where they even have a choice, really
Well, the V8 Accords don’t sell as well as the V8 Fusions, V8 Camrys, and V8… what’s the Chevy again? Impala? Caprice? I don’t even know anymore.
It’s a Camaro and the Ford is a Mustang, both available with V8s (for now).
Toyota should brand their car an LC500.
Which is why I vote they should put on full size suv body shells. Sequoia, Tahoe, Expedition. But then, I haven’t shopped those vehicles in a while. Any still rocking v8s?
Just the Tahoe
Oh right. Monte Carlo gone, call it Impala. Impala gone, call it “SS”. SS gone, call it a Camaro.
Now the Camaro is gone. Equinox next?
While living in North Carolina, just down the road from several of the big racing teams, I heard open outrage and polite mumblings when Toyota was “allowed into” what was considered and American sport. And when Toyota teams started winning, oh my! A portion of fans have accepted, or at least gotten used to, Toyota’s presence, but there is still the portion who will freak out all over again if another “foreign” manufacturer is “let in.”
Abe to German guy- “Where were you during the war?”
German guy- “World War 2? I wasn’t born yet.”
Abe- “Funny how many Germans say that these days.”
The irony being that if Dodge went back in, there’d be nothing but happiness, right?
I do wonder how much smaller that portion would be this time around. The domination of Jeff Gordon in the ’90s starting shrinking the good ole boy cultural totem aspect of NASCAR, then Toyota enters/does well, now there’s a ton of road course events…
Oh yeah, Jeff Gordon — some California kid (California, for damn sakes!) with no history of running moonshine! What is the world coming to?!?!
There’s only one real reason Honda should be in NASCAR: Toyota is in NASCAR
You can’t have your cross-town rival doing something and doing it well and let them sit on that. Doubly so if you tout your motorsports lineage. If it was just GM, Ford and Chrysler, I’d understand but if Toyota is in it so should Honda
This is exactly why NASCAR should be wanting Honda in. They are the natural rival to Toyota. You’d have the Ford vs GM and the Toyota vs Honda.
I think a manufacturer should be required to offer an actual car for sale to be eligible to race in NASCAR. So that means Chevy needs to be kicked out, with the death of the Camaro and Malibu. So if GM wants to stick around, they have to change their brand to Cadillac, or GTFO and make space for the Accord race cars.
Chevy does still have the Corvette, just need to swap out the headlight decals
And the factory team isn’t running in WEC anymore even I think, so why not indeed?
I’d agree with you… if the cars had any actual relation to their stock counterparts. The stock part of stock car was lost with the Gen 4 cars nearly 30 years ago.
So if some brand wants to make the custom tube chassis look like a vehicle that no longer exists, what the hell do I care?
Welp, looks like we need a Chevy Trax branded stock car.
Um… yep, that’s a thing
Or, hear me out, GM takes the CT5 chassis puts new body panels on it, cloth seats, drops in an LT1 V8 and calls it the Chevelle.
Seriously mixed emotions about that idea. I’ve never owned one, but always rather admired their clean lines. I have doubts that a retro Chevelle (autocorrect keeps insisting on Chevette) would look anything but cartoonish given today’s huge wheels and safety constraints.
>paging The Bishop<
The cut of your jib, sir. I like it.
Dodge proved pretty convincingly that there is a market for a traditional muscle car, considering they were able to sell the Challenger essentially un-changed for 15 years. Make your volume seller (Chevelle 300?) version powered by the 2.7 turbo four, then a ‘Malibu’ mid-trim with a 5.3 L84 v8, then a range-topper SS with the 6.2L LT1. Extra style points if they’re available with a bench seat and a bent-handle floor shifter for the 6 speed. 🙂
They’ll just go with CHEVROLET on the nose, bowtie logos, and headlight/grill/taillight art vaguely mimicking the current design language. Same with Honda if they get in the game.
Honda rockin’ a pushrod V8 would be like Mercedes-Benz putting a pushrod V8 in an Indy car. Oh, wait….
It would be easy for Honda to dip into the NASCAR Kit Car parts bin and come up with an entry. And, as a bonus, Honda still builds actual passenger cars.
Rumors have Nissan being the next company to take the plunge. Honda would be better, IMO. And probably has more money to drop on such a project.