NASCAR has suspended nine team personnel and issued over a half million dollars in fines across three Cup Series teams for actions that effectively manipulated the results of a race that decided which teams advanced into the championship race.
While they were not penalized directly, drivers Bubba Wallace, Austin Dillon and Ross Chastain were at the center of efforts to affect the results of the race on Sunday at Martinsville Speedway, under orders from their teams and manufacturers respectively.
Specifically, NASCAR suspended a competition executive, crew chief and spotter for each of the teams involved with both the team and driver fined $200,000 each and penalized 50 points.
From 23XI, NASCAR suspended competition director Dave Rogers, crew chief Bootie Barker and spotter Freddie Kraft. Richard Childress racing saw interim competition director Keith Rodden, crew chief Justin Alexander and spotter Brandon Benesch suspended while the same happened at Trackhouse to chief operating officer Tony Lunders, crew chief Phil Surgen and spotter Brandon McReynolds.
Each team was assessed a 50-point drivers and car owners penalty as well. The suspensions are for one race, the season finale this weekend at Phoenix.
NASCAR senior vice president of competition Elton Sawyer says the sanctioning body considered suspensions to drivers but ultimately landed on team executives instead. The penalties are otherwise identical to the ones assessed after the race at the Charlotte Motor Speedway Roval in 2022 when Stewart-Haas Racing had crew chief Mike Shiplett suspended indefinitely with $100,000 fines to driver Cole Custer and the organization at large.
That year, Custer intentionally slowed and blocked down the backstretch so that teammate Chase Briscoe could make the passes he needed to secure enough points to advance into the next round of the playoffs.
“In this case, we felt like we wanted to focus more on the team leadership, something that we haven’t done in the past,” Sawyer said.
“I promise you, that does not exclude going forward — and we have meetings coming up this week with our drivers — and we will get that point across to them and be very clear that when you do anything that is going to compromise the integrity of our sport, we’re going to react.”
NASCAR already had a competition meeting with drivers scheduled for this weekend but also added a meeting with Chevrolet, Ford and Toyota to discuss the expectations moving forward. Sawyer said the manufacturers were not penalized because there was no mechanism in the rule book to do so.
Sawyer said that NASCAR is prepared to further escalate penalties if this doesn’t stop.
“We will make sure, going forward, if we need to, we will ramp it up again,” Sawyer said. “We will include drivers and manufacturers if we need to. We will get this point across if we need to. We discussed all of the above. The group we landed on, we felt like we wanted to focus on team leadership, something we haven’t done in the past but I promise you, we’ll make clear to drivers too, that when you do anything to compromise the integrity of our sport, we are going to react.”
All three teams immediately announced their intent to appeal and an expedited process will likely come on Thursday.
The situation in question is that William Byron was running sixth in the closing laps on Sunday and could not afford losing a single additional spot or he would lose the final transfer spot to Christopher Bell. The next two cars behind him were Dillon and Chastain, who both had radio communication with their teams, that showed a clean concerted effort to keep anyone else, including the two of them, from passing Byron.
At the same time, there was equally questionable radio communications to Wallace, who was kept appraised of what Bell would need to catch and surpass Byron in points.
Dillon RCR 3 radio
Justin Alexander: “Brandon, the 24 is only two points to the good right now and there’s two sports between them.”
Brandon Benesch: “The 24 is only two points to the good right now on points.”
Justin Alexander: “If we pass them, he’ll be out”
Austin Dillon: “Who is he racing?”
Justin Alexander: “He just can’t give up spots.”
Justin Alexander: “Does (Ross Chastain) know the deal?”
Brandon Benesch: “I’m trying to tell him, Justin can you tell the crew chief?”
Justin Alexander: “12 to go!”
Brandon Benesch: “Does the 1 crew chief know the deal?”
Justin Alexander: “Yeah, he should.”
Chastain Trackhouse 1 radio
Brandon McReynolds: “Nice and smooth with the 24 down there.”
Brandon McReynolds: “Even. Down there even (with the 3 below). Nice and smooth there with the 24. Door.”
Brandon McReynolds: “The 24 is on point to the good there.”
Brandon McReynolds: “Even. Still down there even (with the 3 below). Even.”
Brandon McReynolds: “Doing good. Three more. Even.”
Wallace 23XI Racing 23 radio
Bubba Wallace: “God forbid if we don’t help a fucking JGR car”
Bootie Barker: “Tell him how far back the 20 is Freddie”
Freddie Kraft: “10 to go. 10 to go at the line. Five back 11 and then 10 back to the 24. 24 and 20 are separated by a point right now.”
Freddie Kraft: “Still about half a straightaway back to the 20. You’ll be coming back to five to go.”
(Wallace starts shaking his car back and forth with four to go)
Bubba Wallace: “I think I’ve got a tire going down.”
Bootie Barker: “Nurse it home for us”
Credit to @Basso488 for onboard recordings from the race
Matt Weaver is a Motorsports Insider for Sportsnaut. Follow him on Twitter.
