NASCAR posted some updates to its rule book on Wednesday afternoon. A lot of this is clarifying some items that were previously announced in the off-season.
Damaged Vehicle Policy
NASCAR officially updated its language to Section 8.3.5.2 and 8.8.9, which oversees the Damaged Vehicle Policy
The above section simply details how NASCAR must approve a damaged car to return to the track after making repairs. This approval just allows the car to return to the track in the attempt to make minimum speed. This is just a way for officials to ensure that cars must meet a visual standard of at least meeting safety standards of making that attempt.
These are all additions that will be familiar to anyone that consumed content before the start of the season regarding rule book updates or the annual competition briefing between NASCAR officials, broadcast media and reporters.
Specifically, the last section above addresses what happened to Kyle Busch, who felt unfairly maligned by NASCAR but actually did not understand the policies that were put in place at the start of the season.
Busch had just one attempt to make minimum speed but returned to the garage before the green flag waved and attempted to receive further repairs. That counted as an attempt, even though the green flag hadn’t waived yet.
Teams have just one time spent in the designated repair area to make the appropriate changes and no more than that.
Before this year, teams that went to the garage area were automatically eliminated from the race but as the section above illustrates in written form, even underwing repairs are now allowed. However, the underwing can only be re-attahced with tape or fasteners.
The underwing can not be replaced or patched.
Flat tire policy
This was also known too.
After collaborating with teams over the winter, NASCAR has now decided to tow cars with flat tires to the new designated work area to replace the flats. The first attempt will be to use the vehicle lift system but as the Busch incident illustrated on Sunday, that is not always viable depending on how many tires are flat or how beached a car is after an incident.
But a flat tire that sends a car to the garage no longer results in a DNF now.
Testing procedures
The only thing of note here is that NASCAR is limiting and defining who is allowed to attend tests.
“Rosters will be implemented as deemed necessary by NASCAR. Roster limits will be set to 25 participants, inclusive of OEM and team personnel. The NASCAR Test Event Roster must be submitted to NASCAR via the Event Roster Submission site. All participants must follow sign-in procedures for each test.”
Similar language to this was added for tire tests, manufacturer tests and new organization tests.
Approved Engine Control Unit Software
Approved pit guns
Xfinity Superspeedway rules
In the judgement of NASCAR, vehicles locking bumpers (one vehicle pushing another with continuous contact) will may be black-flagged for a pass-through penalty.
NASCAR is now just saying simply that race control may penalize drivers for locking bumpers as opposed to saying they absolutely would, when in fact, it was coin flip whether or not the action would be met with a penalty.
Matt Weaver is a Motorsports Insider for Sportsnaut. Follow him on Twitter.
