NASCAR Drops Penalties for Martinsville Race Manipulation

By David Morgan, Associate Editor

Since the end of Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race at Martinsville Speedway, the entire industry has been waiting on pins and needles to see what the sanctioning body’s reaction would be to the apparent race manipulation undertaken by 23XI Racing, Richard Childress Racing, and Trackhouse Racing in the closing laps.

On Tuesday, we got our answer.

NASCAR took a deep dive into the data following the race and determined the No. 23 of 23XI Racing, the No. 1 from Trackhouse, and the No. 3 from RCR had all committed acts that violated Sections 4.4.B&D of the NASCAR Rule Book for race manipulation and actions detrimental to stock car racing.

As such, drivers Ross Chastain (Trackhouse), Austin Dillon (RCR), and Bubba Wallace (23XI) were each docked 50 driver points and hit with a $100,000 fine. Their respective owners were also handed the same points and monetary fines.

The crew chiefs and spotters from all three teams were also suspended for the season finale at Phoenix Raceway this coming Sunday. Phil Surgen, Justin Alexander, and Bootie Barker are the crew chiefs suspended, along with spotters Brandon McReynolds, Brandon Benesch and Freddie Kraft.

Team executives from each organization (Tony Lunders, Keith Rodden and Dave Rogers) were also suspended for the Phoenix race.

All three teams announced their intention to appeal the penalties.

The penalties are centered around what occurred with two of the drivers in contention for a spot in the Championship 4, William Byron and Christopher Bell, with each teetering on either being the last driver to make it into the championship race or have to wait another year to make another run at the title.

William Byron was clinging to that final spot, but fading fast, dropping out of the top-five with 14 laps to go, which brought him to just one-point ahead of Bell in the standings.

It seemed to be almost inevitable that Byron would lose additional spots in the final run to the finish, which a herd of cars behind him running faster times, but instead, the first two cars in that group, fellow Chevrolet drivers Austin Dillon and Ross Chastain ran a blockade behind Byron, keeping the rest of the field at bay until he made it home to the checkered flag.

Radio communications for both Dillon and Chastain’s team indicated a concerted effort by both teams to keep Byron from losing any additional spots to keep him in the Championship 4.

Meanwhile, both Christopher Bell was running a lap off the leaders behind Bubba Wallace, who was the first car a lap down but much further up the road to be of any assistance when all of this started.

Over the course of the final laps, Wallace slowed his pace, noting some kind of mechanical issue over the radio, which allowed Bell to catch up to him by the time the field reached Turn 3 on the final lap.

As Wallace entered the turn markedly slower than his competitors, Bell shot past him on the inside to move up the one needed position in the running order to pull even with Byron in the standings. At that point, Bell would have won the tiebreaker based on his runner-up finish in the opening race of the round at Las Vegas.

However, in a move reminiscent of Chastain’s Hail Melon at Martinsville two years ago, Bell’s momentum carried him up the track and into the outside wall, with Bell keeping his his foot in the gas and powering his way to the finish line, seemingly having pulled off a miracle and claimed a spot in the title race.

After a nearly half-hour deliberation by NASCAR officials, they determined that Bell’s move was illegal, dropping him to 22^nd place as the last car a lap down, which in turn dropped him out of the tie with Byron in the standings and eliminated him from the Playoffs.