NASCAR's Mike Forde clarifies CUV intentions amid report of possible switch to electric cars in O'Reilly Series

Earlier this week, a report from Adam Stern of Sports Business Journal suggested that NASCAR was evaluating the possibility of one day using its Crossover Utility Vehicle (CUV) EV in the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series. NASCAR managing director of racing communications Mike Forde clarified the sanctioning body’s position on CUV involvement in the NOAPS on Tuesday.

Stern’s report came after speaking with John Probst, NASCAR’s executive vice president and chief racing development officer. Forde said that Probst “never said there’d be an EV series.”

“He was strictly talking about the body style of that prototype,” Forde wrote on X.

Talk of the NOAPS switching to electric cars in the future heated up after the story was published on Monday. Largely, it was met with opposition from fans and several within the industry, including Dale Earnhardt Jr.

In terms of potentially using the CUV body in the NOAPS, Probst did cite the need to give the NOAPS better brand identity. Both the Truck Series and Cup Series have a clear identity, Probst said, but that’s where the NOAPS is lacking.

Future of CUV in NASCAR has suddenly become major talking poibt

“If you look at the brand identity of those three [national series], the O’Reilly Series struggles a little bit just from the car perspective and you see it a lot because we refer to it often as whoever the entitlement sponsor is,” Probst said.

Probst added, “Long term, you see it as we do, have that CUV body that we developed for our electric vehicle. I’m not sitting here saying today we’re breaking news it’s going to CUV, but these are the things that are on the roadmap to consider. So, you’d have a Truck, a CUV, and a Cup. That’s three very different bodies that are relevant for our OEMs today to create that brand identity for each series.”

Forde further talked about CUV on the latest “Hauler Talk” podcast. He said that in recent years, sedans are disappearing from showroom floors. As a result, NASCAR needs to be ready to work with OEMs if its primary car body becomes obsolete.

“If you look at the production car landscape, sedans aren’t what they used to be, and CUVs are the hot thing right now,” Forde said, via The Daily Downforce. “So that’s just something that we need to be ready for in case there are no sedans in 10 years. So this was a 5 to 10-year thing that’s down the line, not something that’s imminent.”