(VPS Motorimages Photo)

Talk with any auto racing executive in NASCAR and the subject of engines and horsepower is sure to come up — and equally sure to elicit strong and conflicting reactions.

When Toyota dominated the NASCAR Nationwide Series in the first half of the year, at one point winning eight races in a row and 14 of the first 21, NASCAR in July mandated a smaller tapered spacer between the carburetor and intake manifold to reduce horsepower by about 15 in the Toyota engines. The smaller spacer was not required on engines in Chevrolet, Dodge or Ford cars.

Toyota's USA racing boss Lee White called the measure "draconian," adding, "We're going to be here. If we have to race armadillos, we're still going to be here cranking on armadillo horsepower and racing." 

In the first Nationwide race with smaller engine spacers, Kyle Busch led 197 of 200 laps in his Toyota, crushing the field to win at O'Reilly Raceway Park in late July. But overall, since the Toyotas have had to use the smaller spacers, parody seems to have returned to NASCAR's Nationwide Series, as Ford as three victories and Chevrolet and Toyota two each in the post-spacer era.

Now the debate is being carried to the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series, where the sanctioning body last week imposed similar spacer restrictions on the Toyota NCTS engines. Toyota Tundras had won nine of the first 16 Truck races, to five for Chevy and one each for Ford and Dodge.

Just as in the Nationwide Series, Toyota is the only one of the four manufacturers in the NCTS that has the latest-generation engines that conform to NASCAR's newest engine rules. And just as when the Nationwide ruling came down, Toyota officials said they were singled out unfairly with the Truck rules update.

Not surprisingly, Chevrolet officials felt differently, especially after last Saturday's race when Ron Hornaday Jr. broke Toyota's four-race winning streak by capturing a victory at Gateway International Raceway near St. Louis.

Does this mean the manufacturers are back on equal footing in the Truck Series? One of Chevrolet's top racing executives thinks so, citing the ongoing testing NASCAR has done all year to compare horsepower among rival manufacturers. "NASCAR was doing their due diligence by chassis dyno-ing and taking engines back to Concord (N.C., where NASCAR's R&D center is), and putting them on the dyno there," said Pat Suhy, GM Racing Group Manager, Oval Track. "They detected a disparity between that formula (the Toyota engines) and the guys, — us — Chevy, Ford and Dodge and it was fairly consistent, I think."

All this may well become moot next season. Chevrolet already has submitted the new-generation R07 motor it uses in Sprint Cup for approval in the Truck Series next year, and Ford is expected to likewise submit a new engine. Once those engines are approved, everyone will be running the same size spacer and, presumably, there will be the kind of competitive balance in the Truck Series that's been seen in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series this year.

"The easiest way to get out of having special spacers is to approve all the new engines," said Suhy.

NASCAR apparently agrees.

"As was the case with the amendment we recently made in the NASCAR Nationwide Series, all teams that upgrade to new engine packages will be subject to this rule modification," said Robin Pemberton, NASCAR Vice President of Competition. "This is a continuance of the ongoing engine evaluation we've had in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series over the course of this season and is a step we've taken to help further maintain a level playing field among our competitors."

Tom Jensen is the Senior NASCAR Editor for SPEEDtv.com, the former Executive Editor of NASCAR Scene and a contributing Editor for TruckSeries.com.  He is the author of "Cheating: The Bad Things Good NASCAR Nextel Cup Racers Do In Pursuit of SPEED," and has appeared on television and radio shows to discuss NASCAR racing. Jensen is the President of the National Motorsports Press Association.  Jensen is the 1997 National Motorsports Press Association Writer of the Year and has won numerous national and state awards for news reporting, columns and feature writing.