NASCAR hammered Hendrick Motorsports for the air deflector modification, docking all its Phoenix drivers and teams 100 regular-season points and 10 playoff points, suspending each of their Crew Chiefs for four races each, and fined the Crew Chiefs 100,000 US dollars paid.
It is the largest combined penalty for an organization in NASCAR history. NASCAR has issued higher fines for individual violations, but a $400,000 total fine for an organization is the largest.
Kaulig Racing’s Justin Haley and his team received the same penalty.
“We knew these parts had been modified in an unauthorized area,” said Elton Sawyer, NASCAR’s senior vice president of competition.
[NASCAR Power Rankings: William Byron makes a leap after second straight win]
NASCAR also punished Denny Hamlin by deducting 25 points and fined him $50,000 for intentionally destroying Ross Chastain on Sunday’s final lap.
NASCAR confiscated the Hendrick teams’ slats after practice at Phoenix Raceway. The louvers sit on top of the radiator ducts and direct air out of the hood, and any modification could affect downforce.
Sawyer didn’t want to go into detail about what was changed.
The penalties drop Alex Bowman from first to 23rd overall; William Byron from fourth to 29th place; Kyle Larson from fifth to 32nd place.
Chase Elliott, who missed out on Phoenix due to a broken leg, is not penalized and even moves up from 29th to 26th place. His replacement, Josh Berry, does not score in the Cup Series (he scores in the Xfinity Series), but the No. 9 Hendrick team (as well as the other Hendrick teams) was docked at No. 100 in the Owners’ Championship.
Losing 10 playoff points could hurt during NASCAR’s 10-race playoffs. At the beginning of each of the first three rounds, the playoff drivers’ points are reset to the same amount, and then their playoff points are added together. A rider earns one playoff point for winning a stage, five playoff points for winning a race, and earns playoff points toward the end of the regular season overall in a 15-10-8-7-6-5- 4-3-2 -1 scale – where the points penalty could have a big impact in the regular season.
In the three-race playoff rounds, the four playoff drivers who are winless in the round and have the fewest points are eliminated. So the playoff points often help a driver advance to the next round.
video is loading…
This browser does not support the video element.
NASCAR senior vice president of competition Elton Sawyer said it was apparent that Hendrick cars had modified sipes in areas that were not approved.
There have been issues with the new hood and louver designs when it comes to how the louvers are manufactured and how they fit and meet specifications. But the Dallara-designed fins were not meant to be modified in any way – teams were told what they could do to make them fit, but beyond that they cannot modify them.
Hendrick Motorsports announced on Wednesday afternoon that it would appeal the penalties, citing that the sipes they were issued did not meet specifications, that there was no clear communication about changes allowed and that the penalties do not match last year’s because of these Penalties were imposed for modified parts found after the race, not on the first day of the race weekend like Hendrick.
NASCAR’s next-gen car, unveiled last year, is assembled primarily by teams of single-parts and parts suppliers. Because of this, NASCAR had told teams starting last year that they would face significant penalties if they modified these parts. It imposed three similar penalties in the past year.
NASCAR checked all teams’ fins in Phoenix’s garage and confiscated Hendrick’s.
“Every situation is kind of unique but this is more unique than I’ve seen in a while where there has been a lot of back and forth communication about that particular part, especially for this circuit because they did a parity test in the wind tunnel,” said the vice-chairman by Hendrick Motorsports, Jeff Gordon, on Sunday after Byron Phoenix won.
“I think it really opened the door for some misunderstandings. I don’t want to go any further.”
video is loading…
This browser does not support the video element.
Kyle Larson said William Byron just put in a good performance to win in the last restart in Phoenix.
Using fins from other Chevrolet teams, Larson won pole and Byron won the race, with all of the Hendrick drivers finishing in the top 10. It was Byron’s second straight win.
“That really cemented some of the hype and stuff that was centered on Friday [when the pieces were taken]’ said Gordon. “These guys have speed in the car.
“There was nothing, not last week, not this week, that put her on the road to victory except a lot of hard work and great teamwork.”
NASCAR also chose to discipline Hamlin for intentionally destroying Ross Chastain on the final lap in Phoenix – Hamlin finished 23rd; Chastain 24.
Hamlin admitted on his Actions Detrimental podcast that his car didn’t handle well during overtime in Phoenix. A feud with Chastain lasted nearly a year, and Hamlin said when he saw Chastain next to him and knew he was going to lose points because of the way his car drove, he decided to put the right side of his car in Chastain’s left side to slide.
“I’m about to graduate in my mid-teens and I said, ‘You’re coming with me, mate,'” Hamlin said on his podcast. “It wasn’t a mistake. I let go of the steering wheel and said, ‘He’s coming with me.'”
Hamlin called himself a “Dumba—” because he lost about 15 places on the train.
“I don’t want to include other cars. … I saw we were the only people upstairs, so I said, ‘I’m going to send him in the fence and shut it up,'” Hamlin said.
Last year, NASCAR penalized Byron 25 points and fined him $50,000 for intentionally driving under caution at Hamlin during a playoff race in Texas, resulting in a spin at Hamlin. On appeal, the points penalty was overturned, but the fine increased to $100,000.
Following this appeal decision, NASCAR changed the wording in its penalty options for intentionally destroying another vehicle. It used to say “could result in a loss of 25-50 driver and team owner points and/or a $50,000 to $100,000 fine” and NASCAR removed the “and/or” and replaced it with “and” so it it was not possible for the Appellate Body to do one or the other.
Hamlin would have avoided a penalty if he hadn’t said it was intentional. Sawyer said NASCAR had to get involved as soon as he said it was intended.
video is loading…
This browser does not support the video element.
NASCAR senior vice president of competition Elton Sawyer said Denny Hamlin admitted he intentionally destroyed Ross Chastain and compelled the sanctions body to act.
“I’m not going to sit here on this podcast and ever lie to you guys and say, ‘Well, that’s an accident,’ when it wasn’t,” Hamlin said on the podcast. “It wasn’t an accident. I wanted to put him in the fence. But I didn’t want to fool my team.”
Chastain and Hamlin had a long chat after the race. It looked relatively bourgeois.
“The mother —— is hard to shoot,” Hamlin said on the podcast. “If he knows it’s coming, he’s the hardest guy on the planet to destroy.
“I honestly wanted to race with him again and I think that’s a lot of the conversations we had afterwards. … We just have to play each other with more respect from that point on. And that’s what I hope to get out of here. He asked for a truce. I asked for a truce. And let’s see how it goes from here.
Bob Pockrass covers NASCAR for FOX Sports. He has spent decades covering motorsport, including the past 30 Daytona 500, with stints at ESPN, Sporting News, NASCAR Scene Magazine and The (Daytona Beach) News-Journal. Follow him on Twitter @bobpock breedand sign up for the FOX Sports NASCAR newsletter with Bob Pockrass.
The Best NASCAR Stories From FOX Sports: