Sunday’s Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis became more of a track-position battle than natural racing. The dirty air didn’t allow the Next Gens to overtake, and many fans felt they settled for a less-than-exciting race.

Some feel the Cup car is the problem, while some feel even the O’Reilly car faced its own issues, blaming it on the track and aerodynamics of The Brickyard. But to fix this, an ex-FOX broadcaster has a solution from the past.

"All we got to do is create some aerodynamic fins to bolt onto this race car strategically,” said Kenny Wallace on X.

“You remember when I pushed Earnhardt to the last win of his life? We had a Gurney flap on the rear spoiler. It wasn't just a spoiler. Right at the very end, it had a Dan Gurney flap. Then across the roof, we had what was called a wicker bill.”

Wallace is talking about the 2000 Winston 500 at Talladega where he pushed Dale Earnhardt to what became the latter’s final Cup Series win. At the time, the cars had aerodynamic devices like the Gurney flap and the Wicker bill.

The Gurney flap, invented by Dan Gurney, increased the rear downforce and altered the airflow behind the car, helping with drafting. Similarly, the Wicker bill was a small vertical lip that was fitted to the roof. Like the Gurney flap, it also manipulated airflow to create more drag and helped the cars behind to draft better.

Wallace feels those tweaks in the past improved racing without redesigning the whole thing. He feels this is what NASCAR should do with the Next Gen right now.

“This can be done to make the outer and the upper body effective. We need to create drag with the car in front so the car behind can get a run, pull out, and pass. And the crowd comes to their feet,” added Wallace on his post.

Wallace arguably agreed that many feel the O’Reilly car is better, but those cars also faced the same issue at Indianapolis. This is because Brickyard’s long and flat straightaways end in narrow 90-degree corners. The dirty air makes it difficult to pass. But a bigger aerodynamic wake can help the trailing car better.

“So what we're going to do with this car is we're not going to scrap the car. We're not going to spend a million dollars on the car so it will race good at one racetrack. We're going to bolt some fins on this car that are going to create a wake of air.”

While Wallace’s solutions could be helpful, the effect of the 2026 race has already entered a bigger conversation where fans are debating whether to even have the Brickyard race at all. And Wallace came to its defense.

Kenny Wallace is not even considering dropping Brickyard

Wallace was shocked to know the conversation is real. He outright rejected the idea of dropping the race from the calendar.

“I respectfully say, get it out of your head that we’re going to throw the racetrack away. Let’s get rid of the racetrack. Have you lost your damn mind?” he said, as reported by Heavy.

He did acknowledge that the race didn’t deliver according to the fan’s expectations, but he advised seeing the bigger picture in the sport, in the sense that the racing has generally improved.

“We’ve come off a year of great NASCAR racing. We’ve had so many good races.”

North Wilkesboro, All-Star, and the Atlanta races were some examples he used that reminded fans of the old NASCAR days.

Do you feel Wallace's solution can tackle the issue? Drop your opinion in the comments!

Written by

Suyashdeep Sason

Edited by

Suyashdeep Sason