NASCAR Hall of Famer Mark Martin has become increasingly outspoken about NASCAR since retiring from racing in 2013.
The Arkansas native and 40-time Cup Series race winner made his opinion of the current state of the sport known on the latest episode of ‘The Kenny Conversation’ with fellow former driver Kenny Wallace.
While Martin remains an avid fan in retirement, he made it clear that he thinks gimmicks have become too plentiful in modern NASCAR.
“The integrity of our sport is important to me,” Martin said. “I feel like what I accomplished in my career is being diminished by gimmicks.”
One of those perceived gimmicks is NASCAR’s current playoff format, specifically the single championship race that determines the title among the Championship 4 drivers.
“Joey [Logano] being 20th-place in the points and winning the championship last year, that should’ve been the nail in the coffin for that playoff system,” Martin said. “There’s debate whether the [final round] should be three races, or if it should be five — still, most of the fans want 36 (a full season championship). I wouldn’t bash NASCAR if they went back to 10. I think five is too little. I don’t think it’s a large enough sample.”
