Johnson calls for Cup car changes

Johnson has said NASCAR needs to find the way to generate more front downforce on the new Cup car and improve its handling in dirty air at intermediate tracks like Texas, because the teams are currently very constrained in what they can do to change that.

"This car is so much bigger," Johnson said. "It is safer and that's a great thing. But I'd love to see NASCAR talk to some team engineers and their guys get together and think: 'All right, what's a logical step that's not going to cost millions and millions of dollars to get some more front downforce in the cars so you don't get so tight in traffic'.

"It seems that we have plenty of rear grip from time-to-time with the aero balance and you can adjust the wing there. But the cars really need some front downforce."

The new Cup car has a rear wing instead of the spoiler that the old car had, and an adjustable splitter helps generate downforce at the front, while in the past they only relied on tweaking with the air dam.

Most teams have struggled to get enough front-end grip with the new car to get it to turn properly in the middle of the corners, not only due to its aero balance but also due to the different suspension layout, which relies a lot on bump-stops on the front dampers.

Johnson also believes it is necessary to make changes to the car so that racing on the bigger tracks improves, because due to its current characteristics, drivers are afraid of running close to one another.

"The cars are more important now, in set-up, than what they were before," Johnson added. "Now this is on the big tracks. The shorter tracks, aero is bad. Bristol, we saw a good race. Martinsville is still Martinsville. But these bigger tracks, you can't hide the aero deficiencies that these cars have. That's just how it is.

"We're all afraid to run side-by-side and you can only get so close to the guy in front of you and we just sit there in a safe spot and ride because you can't go anywhere."

Johnson had already mentioned the issue in January after struggling during a test at Las Vegas where he later raced and finished 29th and two laps down.

Some teams are believed to have already spoken to NASCAR about tweaking the front end of the cars and possibly adding a larger splitter to generate more downforce and improve its aerodynamic balance.