The Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series has a caution problem.

More accurately stated, the highest level of stock car racing is suffering from a lack of cautions, which is having negative consequences on the on-track racing product.

While cautions slow the pace of any given race, they also create built-in commercial time where fans do not miss as much green flag action, while also creating divergent strategies, which leads to a more exciting race.

Over the past decade, cautions for on-track incidents have decreased to the point where you could make the case that they are becoming ever closer to outright extinction.

And while the 2019 rules package hasn’t helped matters with a car that generates so much downforce that it is extremely difficult to spin out, this is actually a trend that began a decade ago. The current crop of drivers is too talented, has too much experience compared to predecessors and races more conservatively than ever before.

NASCAR is aware of this, of course.

It’s part of the reason it implemented stage racing prior to the 2017 season. Races across all three national tours now have two built-in cautions at the one-third and halfway markers of every race. The decision was also surely a byproduct of fans accusing the sanctioning body of fabricating debris cautions prior to the advent of stage racing.

The 2019 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series season has thus far been the most uneventful in history as it pertains to natural cautions (those that did not come as a result of anything other than a stage break).

The Cup Series is averaging 4.5 natural cautions this season, but the number is actually just four when you eliminate the two restrictor plate races from the formula. That’s down from an average of seven natural cautions from 2015-2018.

As much as cautions have been trending downward over the past decade, high downforce has stabilized the current Cup Series cars to such a point that it’s pretty much a slot car race at most stops on the tour this season.

NASCAR had hoped the new rules package would create additional contact, especially on restarts where cars are closer together than ever before, but that hasn’t happened either.

Cars slowly get strung out and are largely stuck in place.

"What do you want me to do, wreck them all?" Clint Bowyer sarcastically said with a laugh last month at Talladega. "Yes, I thought the 550-hp (version of the rules) package would create exactly what it did on the restarts.

"I thought the intensity would be very strong on restarts on the 1.5-mile tracks in particular. ... I think the downforce with these cars (are why we're not wrecking), but I think the tires (are) probably a bigger part of that.

"These cars drive really well this year, and I think the point is proven when you put us four- or five-wide on restarts, wide open, and we still don't crash. That's how stable they are underneath us."

In other words, four- and five-wide really isn’t that thrilling when cars are planted to the ground.

Erik Jones of Joe Gibbs Racing offered a similar observation.

"The cars are definitely easier to drive more than what we had with low downforce," Jones said. "You still find yourself in tough spots, three- or four-wide, but it's easier to manage now.

"But even before this year, racers are smarter than ever before. They're not going to put you in a compromising spot because that puts them in one too. But these cars today just aren't on edge anymore. It's not a Sunday drive, but where before you had to drive loose, drive off your front end or rear end, the cars today are planted and we're just wide-open."

There were numerous points at Richmond last month where cars struggled to pass a leading car as a result of dirty air put off by the 8-inch spoiler. So a trailing driver would just shove a leading car in the middle of the corner without incident.

Cup cars are that stuck to the ground.

Cup Series veteran David Ragan agrees that drivers are more talented than ever before, but also believes the current tires are too durable and that Cup Series bodies are not durable enough -- the latter making drivers afraid to utilize their bumpers.

"I saw what Clint Bowyer said, and he's right about the tires being too good these days," Ragan said. "We need to get back to where we achieve grip through the tire and not so much aerodynamics. When you achieve grip through the tires, a driver can control how much of that he uses.

"With the cars that we race today, they race close to the same on lap 1 as lap 50. And in my opinion, that's not a good formula for racing, be it Legends, Late Models, IndyCar or NASCAR. Good racing is when you have a tire fall off."

Ragan said Goodyear has been too conservative with its tire construction ever since the "tire-gate" incident during the 2008 Brickyard 400 at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

There is a sentiment that Goodyear can’t build a softer tire with such a high-downforce racing package. That leads to blowouts similar to what happened at the 2008 Brickyard. However, Ragan believes Goodyear can be a little less conservative and also thinks drivers don’t have to run nearly wide-open on a tire throughout a fuel run.

Even before the 2019 package, drivers accused Goodyear of a tire that didn’t give up too much over a longer period of time.

"You should be able to blow a right front tire if you run on it too hard," Ragan said. "I remember when I first came into the series, I would be told by my crew chief to run 80 to 85 percent, and we would still be close on the tire. Now, we're 100 percent on the tire over a fuel run and you don't blow right fronts -- not even on the short tracks.

"I'm not an advocate for wrecking cars, but this is a premier motorsport. It's OK to wreck a little bit. We can't be afraid of wrecking a little bit. We have SAFER Barriers and HANS devices.

"We don't want to wreck. I don't want to wreck, but our fans want to see some excitement. I don't mean wrecks like we have at Talladega, destroying 25 race cars in one wreck, but we do need to have some guys bouncing off the wall and be able to hit each other and be able to keep going."

Which leads to the next issue with bodies that are too fragile. Ragan, of course, cited driver talent, the sideforce generated by the Gen 6 car, tires and, lastly, the body.

"I think the fourth factor is that we are afraid to hit each other," Ragan said. "These cars are too damn sensitive in the air and easy to bend. We need to put some tough sheetmetal on these cars. The fact that we run 180 mph is important. We're not running Martinsville every week.

"But we have to put some thicker bumpers on the cars, and I think they're going to do that with the 2021 package. If someone makes me mad, I'm afraid to hit them, because it's going to hurt me more than it's going to hurt them. You're afraid to hit people and spin them out. You used to be able to root people off the track and spin them out, and you just can't do that anymore. I think those are the four things that attribute to fewer cautions."

The Xfinity Series recently moved to a composite material body, instead of steel, which has proven to be more durable to contact. It’s no secret that the 2021 Cup Series body could feature the same construction, allowing drivers to be more aggressive with each other or the wall.

Brad Keselowski said there was a lot of merit to what both Bowyer and Ragan said, while also forecasting that he expected a more durable body to come to the Cup Series with the next generation of car.

"I've been watching the Xfinity Series, and those guys race each other pretty hard, bounce off the wall and still race for wins in ways that I don't think is possible for our cars right now," he said.

What exactly would Ragan want to see in a Gen 7 body?

"Remember that race at Darlington that Kyle Busch won after he bounced off the wall 15 times during the race in the original Car of Tomorrow," Ragan said. "Those things were tough. We had thick rocker panels. The sheetmetal was thicker at the time.

"Race teams always work to make the cars lighter, and they're lighter now than they've ever been. But I can't even imagine hitting the wall once without killing it, like (Kyle) Larson at Richmond. That shouldn't have done anything to the car. So yes, we need to make tires less durable and make the cars more durable."

And maybe then, perhaps with a slightly different competition package, cautions will return to the highest level of stock car racing.

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