"The cars have gotten much safer": Jeff Gordon addresses NASCAR's woes amid Ryan Preece's Daytona 500 flip

Jeff Gordon recently shared his take on the safety aspect of NASCAR Next Gen cars. The Hendrick Motorsports legend was asked about this subject in the post-Daytona 500 press interaction after #24 driver William Byron won the big race for the second year in a row.

One major notable incident from the race was the Ryan Preece's flip. After Christopher Bell made contact with Preece's #60 Mustang, it flipped off, landed on it's roof and hit the wall. The RFK Racing driver also suffered a similar incident at Daytona in 2023 when his SHR challenger flipped multiple times in the air.

After the race, Ryan Preece urged NASCAR to improve the Next Gen cars to prevent them from flipping with the risk of a driver potentially suffering from major injuries.

This was an incident brought to Jeff Gordon's attention, as a reporter mentioned about the era of superspeedway racing he came from. The reporter wondered if Jeff Gordon agreed with Preece's comments and asked to share his take on NASCAR preventing cars from going airborne

Gordon said that because he didn't hear Preece's exact comments, he wouldn't share his take on those. Having said that, he described what his thoughts were on safety in superspeedway races.

"Ever since I came into NASCAR and we went on a superspeedway, that conversation has been happening, especially when they went to restrictor plates and started pack racing. It’s always been on the drivers’ minds, and it’s always been that balance between entertainment and luck of the draw or whatever you want to call it. Then there’s the safety aspect of it, too. The cars, as they continue to be bumper cars at 200 miles per hour, then you’re going to have a lot of wrecks. The cars have gotten much safer, though, as well," Jeff Gordon said. [10:50]

Gordon mentioned that Ryan Preece being vocal about his frustrations is only natural considering he's had two such incidents in as many seasons.

Jeff Gordon claims teams have to 'rely on NASCAR' to improve the current safety scenario

Addressing the issue of safety in NASCAR following Ryan Preece's flip in Daytona 500, Jeff Gordon claimed that the governing body is paying attention. The 4x Cup champion said that NASCAR is always looking at such incidents in order to improve what can be done to keep 'the cars on the ground.'

"I think as teams we’ll offer everything we can, but we’re focused on building fast race cars to go win and be safe," Gordon added. [12:00]

The Hendrick Motorsports vice chairman pressed that teams have to 'rely on NASCAR' to do the testing to make the cars as safe as possible.

With that said, it'll be interesting to see if and what measures NASCAR comes up with to improve this issue at hand.