Next Gen car proving to be a handful at Auto Club

As some of the NASCAR Cup Series’ top drivers struggled with their Next Gen cars Saturday at Auto Club Speedway, one Hall of Famer was pleased.

“Watching these guys spin out trying to qualify is what driving in NASCAR is all about,” tweeted Hall of Famer Mark Martin, who added that Cup cars should be one of the hardest to drive in motorsports and that “as a driver if you want to succeed in Cup you better pack your lunch.”

By the time the Cup practice/qualifying event ended, 10 of 36 cars entered for Sunday’s race had either spun or crashed.

Austin Cindric won the pole after Chase Elliott, the 2020 Cup champion, became the third driver to spin on their final round qualifying attempt. The other two were Elliott’s teammate, William Byron, and another former Cup champion, Brad Keselowski.

Cindric said he wasn’t surprised at everything that happened with all the variables in play – a new car, a track the series hadn’t seen since 2020, gusty conditions, and a condensed schedule thanks to NASCAR’s new practice/qualifying format.

But when asked if it was good that the Next Gen cars were hard to drive, Cindric felt it wasn’t his place to decide, instead saying they were “enjoyable to a certain extent.”

“The hard-to-drive part is different than in years past,” the Daytona 500 winner elaborated. “When you go to Darlington or Fontana or Atlanta in the past, it was hard to drive but controllable. I think with this car, you don’t have as much sidewall deflection and you don’t have the side force. Your ‘hard to drive’ is defined by different things. I am not going to sit here and tell you that I know what all those things are.

“You have to be somewhat conservative in some areas and somewhat aggressive in other areas. I was having to