The Engine
At its heart, a NASCAR race car engine is no different from the engine in your family's car. They both use pistons and they both burn gasoline. But that's where the similarities end.

A NASCAR race car engine is called a V-8 engine. It has 8 pistons. By family-car standards the engine is huge -- about 5.6 liters. Your family's car might have a 2 liter or a 3 liter engine. And the horsepower of a NASCAR race car is amazing. A typical car will have something like a 150 or 200 horsepower engine, while a NASCAR race car engine can create 750 horsepower for hours at a time.

Photo courtesy Action Sports Photography, Inc.

The power from an engine comes when it burns gasoline. When it ignites, gasoline turns from a liquid into a very hot gas, and expands in the process. The expansion of the gas is what pushes on the piston and makes the car go.

Cool Fact! NASCAR teams build two types of cars. They build cars for the short tracks, like Bristol Motor Speedway in Tennessee, where top speeds are lower and turns are tighter. They also build cars for the super-speedways, like Talladega in Alabama, where top speeds are higher but engine power is limited.

For a race car engine to create 750 horsepower, it has to burn a lot of gasoline. The gasoline needs a lot of air to give it the oxygen it needs to ignite. Then all of that hot exhaust has to get out of the engine through the exhaust pipe. In a NASCAR race car engine, engineers work hard to make sure that all of the air and exhaust flowing through the engine can move as easily as possible. That's why there are no mufflers in a NASCAR race. A muffler would slow the exhaust down and rob power from the engine. Without mufflers, the cars go faster, but the races are unbelievably loud if you are there in person.

Your family car, when it is going down the freeway, burns a gallon of gas every 30 minutes or so. A NASCAR race car engine burns a gallon of gas in less than two minutes. That's one reason why there are so many pit stops in a race. It only takes 20 minutes to burn a full tank of gas.