Thursday, April 25, 2013

Bad Day For Wisconsin NASCAR Drivers

From ESPN: NASCAR came down hard Wednesday on the Joe Gibbs Racing team of Matt Kenseth after the engine in the winning No. 20 car from Sunday's Sprint Cup race at Kansas Speedway failed inspection.
Kenseth was penalized 50 points in the standings and his crew chief, Jason Ratcliff, was suspended for six races -- as well as the May 18 All-Star race -- and fined $200,000 after the engine failed a secondary postrace inspection....
The president of Toyota Racing Development was quick to take full blame for the violation that cost Kenseth and JGR everything but the trophy and the official win.
"This is a total screw-up on our part,'' Lee White told ESPN.com. "I'm not going to point fingers at anybody. This is on my head. We neglected to double- and triple-check a shipment of parts from a European vender."
Kenseth was essentially stripped of the win -- he also lost the three bonus points he earned for the win that would have been applied in seeding for the Chase for the Sprint Cup championship. His pole, which would have made him eligible for the 2014 Sprint Unlimited at Daytona International Speedway, also was rescinded.  http://espn.go.com/racing/nascar/cup/story/_/id/9206870/nascar-lowers-boom-matt-kenseth-engine-partAndJohnny Sauter lost the lead in the Truck Series standings Wednesday when NASCAR docked him 25 points for a modified fuel cell found during inspection last weekend at Kansas Speedway.Sauter's crew chief, Joe Shear, was fined $10,000, suspended for the next four races and placed on probation until Dec. 31.
The penalty knocked Sauter from a 12-point lead over Matt Crafton in the standings to a tie with Jeb Burton in second, 13 points out.
The fuel cell was confiscated during the opening day of inspection at Kansas. According to NASCAR's release, there was an unapproved modification to the fuel cell safety foam.  http://espn.go.com/racing/nascar/truck/story/_/id/9207249/johnny-sauter-loses-nascar-truck-lead-points-penalty
Personally, I think the penalties against the drivers seem to Draconian, since it was not their fault.

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