"Product on the racetrack is good as it's ever been" - NASCAR’s recent response suggests Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s practice wish may not be fulfilled

Dale Earnhardt Jr. recently took to his podcast to demand NASCAR for more practice.

Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s reasons for more practice were motivated by the interests of a couple of major personalities in the garage in Jimmie Johnson and Shane Van Gisbergen, claiming that more practice would help them do better, and them doing better would help the sport.

However, the more recent comments of NASCAR's senior Vice President of competition Elton Sawyer suggests that they won't go back to more practice the way it used to be before the COVID-19 pandemic broke out.

"It wasn't all about the cost, which was a huge part of it for all of us, not just the garage area or the TV partners or our track partners. Collectively all the stakeholders weighed in on what we needed. And we arrived at the format that we have today. And I would say if you look at the data as well as the eye test, our product on the racetrack is as good as it's ever been," Sawyer said.

It's worth mentioning that Sawyer didn't outrightly deny they won't have more practice.

It's his comments that suggested that NASCAR's product is as good as ever, and hence, there's no room for improvement, so no extra time for practice.

Chase Elliott had a different take than Dale Earnhardt Jr. on "more practice" in NASCAR

While names like Dale Earnhardt Jr., and Kyle Busch have expressed their desire in one way or the other to have more practice before races, NASCAR's most popular driver Chase Elliott is of the opinion that things are right the way they are, that there's nothing that needs fixing.

Elliott recently claimed that he believes they have "enough practice."

"I certainly can understand their perspective on guys, either running a part-time schedule or people that are running maybe full-time in Xfinity, like Shane is, and then running a few Cup races here and there," Elliott described.

He further added that when he looks at the argument of having more practice, he thinks of drivers running on short tracks and dirt tracks across the country with races on every Friday and Saturday night. The #9 driver claimed that in those races, drivers get five laps of hot laps and they go straight to racing.

Elliott believes that if in NASCAR, they're "supposed to be professionals" and top of their class, why should they get an hour-and-a-half of practice when drivers who come up through the ranks only get five laps before a race.