NASCAR Eyes Elevated Penalties for Future Race Manipulation
Manipulation of races has been one of the dirty secrets in NASCAR, and all forms of motorsports where teams are allowed to field more than one entry, or when multiple teams are involved in alliances or partnerships by way of a manufacturer, sponsor, or any other connection. NASCAR determined that race manipulation was prevalent in the finish of last Sunday's Xfinity 500 at Martinsville Speedway, a race that finalized the Championship 4 field.
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After much outcry on social media, NASCAR included a hefty list of penalties on its weekly penalty report, which dropped on Tuesday evening, the largest penalties were revolving around the three teams accused of race manipulation.
In all, 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 was docked 50 championship owner and championship driver points. While the penalties were large at face value, NASCAR is prepared to add additional penalties for future infractions of race manipulation in an effort to stomp it out.
Elton Sawyer, in an interview with SiriusXM NASCAR Radio's The Morning Drive on Wednesday, said that while the sanctioning body opted to issue heavier penalties to the team executives, crew chiefs, and spotters involved in this case, that they will look at adding penalties to the manufacturers (OEMs), who coordinate the manipulation efforts, as well as the drivers involved.
“We did discuss adding drivers, we did discuss adding our OEMs to that list,” Sawyer admitted. “At this point in time, there’s not language in the rule book that would allow us to penalize our OEMs. We plan to address that in the offseason.”
While NASCAR will have to wait until the offseason to add language in the rule book, which allows the sanctioning body to penalize manufacturers for race manipulation, Sawyer says if race manipulation continues this weekend in the NASCAR Cup Series Championship Race at Phoenix Raceway or in the future, drivers could be added to the list of those suspended.
“We plan this week to have meetings with all of our stakeholders to make our point very clear. Going forward, we will include drivers in this if we have to,” Sawyer explained. “This is something that is not going to be tolerated, and we’re not going to be dealing with this. And we’re going to be going to the racetracks, and giving our fans the best product that we possibly can on the racetrack. 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 issued penalties for blocking for fellow Chevrolet driver William Byron in the closing laps of Sunday's race, and Bubba Wallace and the No. 23 23XI Racing team were penalized for slowing to allow Christopher Bell, a fellow Toyota driver, by them on the final lap, all three teams have indicated that they plan to appeal the penalties handed to them on Tuesday.
Those penalties will be expedited, and are expected to be completed before this weekend's race at Phoenix Raceway.
Toby Christie is the Editor-in-Chief of Racing America. He has 15 years of experience as a motorsports journalist and has been with Racing America since 2023.