Throw the current car templates in the garbage can.  Go to Ford, Chevy, and Toyota and make one of the factory cars.  Next, you have to take off the restrictions on the cars, no restrictor plates, no rear gear rules, no transmission rules.  Just limit the engine size like they currently do.  Bring back racing to the caution flag, at least under 15 to go.  This stage crap can be thrown away.  It keeps to many cars that are complete junk in the game at the end, it's no wonder they have so many crashes.  They need to only go to each cookie cutter track once a year, not twice as they do some, for that matter, go to every track once a year.  Fill the reminder with different short tracks with varying shapes and banking, and a couple more road courses.  Offer multiple sets of tires like they used too.  They tried it again a few years back once, but didn't implement it again.  The qualifying format isn't bad, but I wouldn't do it in stages either.  Run practice, then have all the cars out there to run so many minutes.  Set the field by each cars fastest lap and be done with it.  Maybe give them one more practice before the race.