Ford Fusion for 2013 NASCAR Design

Given the “Race on Sunday, buy on Monday” notion—or, better, “Win on Sunday, sell a whole lot on Monday”—that underlies part of the rationale for OEM participation in racing series, Ford has redesigned the 2013 NASCAR Fusion to better reflect the forthcoming 2013 Fusion for drivers who generally do more than turn left.

This is what the production 2013 Fusion looks like:

Here’s a rendering of the 2013 Sprint Cup car:

Said Garen Nicoghosian, Ford design manager in charge of the NASCAR project, “We took advantage of this opportunity and sculpted a more aggressive front end and we added grille bars that are identical in design to the production car. We also added more detail to the fog light housings, and created a more detailed headlight area, as well.

“In addition, we also sculpted a more aggressive hood, and were able to achieve a closer look to the production car.”

Of course, what’s under that more aggressive hood is, well, something more aggressive than the 237-hp 2.0-liter EcoBoost under the hood of the production car.