One cannot expect the high-performance cars in NASCAR to just use the fuel that a normal road car gets from the gas station and run as fast as they usually do. Therefore, NASCAR uses a special and filtered blend of gasoline and ethanol, which is called Sunoco Green E15 or just Green E15, due to its characteristic green color. Needless to say, the Green E15 caters to the needs of the powerful engines on a stock car throughout the season. On that note, you might wonder how much this unleaded fuel blend might cost the teams.
Before going into that, let's take a look at how much fuel a bigshot team like Joe Gibbs Racing needs throughout the year. The regular NASCAR season holds 38 races, each of which ranges anywhere between 37 to 600 miles. So, for one car, the total distance covered can shoot up to 13,000 miles or even more. So for a team that has four entries (like Joe Gibbs Racing) in those events, it's 52,000 miles per season. This means they need about 10,400 gallons of fuel, and that excludes what they need during practice and qualifying sessions.
How much does a gallon of NASCAR fuel cost?
In the US, a gallon of normal gas costs about $3.10 per gallon. However, the Sunoco Green E15 costs $16-$17 per gallon, making it almost six times costlier than the normal fuel available in the States. But that is not even the most interesting fact. Here things get wilder.
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Do NASCAR teams pay for their fuel?
In a Joe Gibbs Racing video, team president Dave Alpern himself answered that question. “Fortunately, we get our fuel for free. So we actually spend zero dollars a year on race fuel,” he said. As it is, NASCAR is a really expensive sport. Thanks to NASCAR and Sunoco, the teams do not have to incur an additional cost of about $1,75,000 per year (that is just for the main events)
FAQ's On NASCAR fuel
A. Yes, they do. American ethanol makes up to 15 percent of the Sunoco Green E15.
A. Sunoco is the official fuel provider for NASCAR as well as the NHRA.
A. Currently, F1 uses E10 fuel, which uses 10 percent ethanol.
A. Throughout the years, various forms of motorsport have resorted to nitromethane and methanol as fuel for their cars.
A. One can purchase the Green E15 in a five-gallon tank or a 55-gallon drum.
