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NASCAR Eyes Increased Penalties for Future Race Tampering

NASCAR Eyes Increased Penalties for Future Race Tampering

Race rigging is one of the dirty secrets in NASCAR and all forms of motorsports where teams are allowed to make more than one entry, or when multiple teams are involved in alliances or partnerships through a manufacturer, sponsor or otherwise. connection. NASCAR determined that race manipulation was prevalent at the finish of last Sunday’s Xfinity 500 at Martinsville Speedway, a race that rounded out the Championship 4 field.

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After much outrage on social media, NASCAR included a hefty list of penalties in its weekly penalty report, which was dropped Tuesday evening. The biggest penalties were for the three teams accused of race manipulation.

In total, NASCAR suspended nine members of three teams (a Team Executive, Crew Chief, and Spotter), fined the drivers and teams involved a combined $600,000 ($100,00 for each driver and $100,000 for each team), and each driver and team received 50 Championship Owner and Championship Driver points. While the penalties were significant on the face of it, NASCAR is prepared to impose additional penalties for future race-rigging violations in an effort to eliminate them.

Elton Sawyer said Wednesday in an interview with SiriusXM NASCAR Radio’s The Morning Drive that while the sanctioning body has opted to impose stiffer penalties on the team leaders, crew chiefs and spotters involved in the case, they will look at adding punish the team leaders, crew chiefs and spotters involved in this case. the manufacturers (OEMs), who coordinate the tampering efforts, as well as the drivers involved.

“We’ve talked about adding drivers, we’ve talked about adding our OEMs to that list,” Sawyer admitted. “Currently, there is no language in the rulebook that would allow us to penalize our OEMs. We plan to address this in the offseason.”

While NASCAR will have to wait until the offseason to add language to the rulebook allowing the sanctioning body to penalize manufacturers for race manipulation, Sawyer says that if race manipulation continues this weekend in the NASCAR Cup Series Championship Race at Phoenix Raceway or in the future directors could be added to the list of suspended directors.

“We plan to hold meetings with all our stakeholders this week to make our point very clear. In the future we will involve drivers if necessary,” Sawyer explains. “This is something that will not be tolerated, and we are not going to have to deal with this. And we go to the race tracks and give our fans the best product possible on the race track. That is our goal.”

While Ross Chastain and the No. 1 Trackhouse Racing team and Austin Dillon and the No. 3 Richard Childress Racing team were assessed penalties for blocking fellow Chevrolet driver William Byron in the closing laps of Sunday’s race, and Bubba Wallace and the No. 23 The 23XI Racing team was penalized for slowing down to allow Christopher Bell, a fellow Toyota driver, on the final lap. All three teams have indicated they plan to appeal the penalties imposed on them on Tuesday.

These penalties will be accelerated and are expected to be completed before this weekend’s race at Phoenix Raceway.