Elton Sawyer threatens NASCAR drivers with race manipulation penalties after Martinsville controversy
NASCAR senior vice president of competition Elton Sawyer said Wednesday that race manipulation is “not gonna be tolerated” and drivers could be subject to future penalties moving forward.
Sawyer made the comments on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, one day removed from the sanctioning body issuing penalties to three teams for violating the Member Code of Conduct during this past Sunday’s Xfinity 500 at Martinsville Speedway.
“We discuss adding drivers, we discuss adding our OEMs [Original Equipment Manufacturers] to that list,” Sawyer said. “At this point in time, there’s not language in the rulebook that would allow us to penalize our OEMs. We plan to address that in the offseason. We discussed in length our drivers we felt like in this particular case, we wanted to focus on the executive group around the race teams that are making these decisions that are giving this information to the drivers.
“I get it, the drivers drive the car, turn the wheel, push the pedal, we get it. But in this case, we wanted to focus on the folks that are making those decisions and giving the drivers that information. We plan this week to have meetings with all of our stakeholders to make our point very clear going forward that we will include drivers in this if we have to. This is something that’s not gonna be tolerated. We’re not going to be dealing with this, and we’re going to be going to the racetracks and giving our fans the best product that we possibly can on the racetrack. That’s our goal.”
NASCAR penalizes Bubba Wallace, Austin Dillon, Ross Chastain after controversial Martinsville finish
In the closing laps of the Round of 8 finale, Ross Chastain and Austin Dillon formed a blockade behind fellow Chevrolet driver William Byron, who needed to avoid being passed to clinch his spot in the Championship 4 at Phoenix this Sunday.
On the last lap of the race, Bubba Wallace appeared to slow up to allow fellow Toyota driver Christopher Bell to make the pass, which gave him the final transfer spot over Byron. NASCAR later penalized Bell for riding the wall in Turns 3 and 4 to make the pass on Wallace. That gave Byron the final spot in the Championship 4.
Chastain, Dillon and Wallace were levied a penalty of a loss of 50 driver points and a $100,000 fine. In addition, NASCAR fined the owners of each team $100,000 and deducted 50 owner points each. Crew chiefs Phil Surgen [Chastain], Justin Alexander [Dillon] and Bootie Barker [Wallace], along with their respective spotters Brandon McReynolds, Brandon Benesch and Freddie Kraft, were suspended for the 2024 season finale at Phoenix.
All three teams are appealing the ruling. Sawyer further explained the ruling to NASCAR.com.
“We took and looked at the most recent penalty that we had written for an infraction, very similar, which was the 41 car a couple of years ago at the Roval,” Sawyer said. “We felt like we wanted to ramp this one up and we did, we did that in a way that we included team leadership.
“And this one, something that we feel like that, you know, we want to get our point across that it’s a responsibility of all of us, the team owners, the team leadership as well as ourselves here at NASCAR to uphold the integrity of our sport.”
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