DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – NASCAR issued an extensive technical bulletin Friday that addressed a number of things, including safety enhancements following the last-lap crash in the Daytona 500 that injured Ryan Newman.
As part of the changes, all teams will be required to add two roll bars to the interior of the car. NASCAR is also eliminating aero ducts at superspeedway tracks like Daytona and they’ve reduced the size of the throttle body for events on superspeedways.
“As teams prepare for the return to racing, we want to provide as much advance notice as possible for upcoming technical changes,” John Probst, NASCAR senior vice president of racing development, told NASCAR.com. “Some of these updates stem from the investigation into the six-car incident at Daytona, and all are intended to produce a safe and competitive race at all venues. We look forward to providing more details in the near future.”
Also as part of the technical bulletin, NASCAR announced the ban on wind tunnel and simulator testing would be mostly lifted on May 4. However, NASCAR will not allow on-track testing for the NASCAR Cup Series, NASCAR Xfinity Series or NASCAR Gander RV & Outdoors Truck Series for the rest of the year.
In addition, teams will be limited to 150 wind tunnel hours through the end of 2021, with 70 hours allowed in 2020 and 90 hours allowed in 2021. NASCAR has also banned wind tunnel testing for the Next Gen car, which will debut in 2022.