Have a FaceBook, Twitter, or other social networking account?

Link them to your fanatic account!

Add An Account

TAKE ME TO...
NASCAR Sprint-Cup Series
CUP: Tech Disclosure Raises Lots Of Questions
NASCAR officials said that the top two cars at Dover passed inspection...
Tom Jensen  |  Posted October 02, 2009   Kansas City, KS
NASCAR inspected both Jimmie Johnson's and Mark Martin's cars after the Sprint Cup Series race at Dover International Speedway last week. (Photo: LAT Photographic)

NASCAR inspections are supposed to be like pregnancy tests. After completion, there should be no doubt whatsoever about where you stand.

In fact, one of the rationales for the Car of Tomorrow was that it would remove gray areas and ambivalence about whether cars were legal or not: Either the COT fits the myriad templates and measurements and is legal or it doesn’t and it isn’t.

Either there’s a blue line on the pregnancy test strip or there isn’t.

What there isn’t afterwards in either case is ambivalence.

Except for now, with the strange saga of the Hendrick Motorsports No. 48 and 5 cars, the winner and runner-up, respectively, at Dover International Speedway last week.

Officially, NASCAR declared those two cars legal after examining them at the sanctioning body’s R&D center.

But — and it’s a J. Lo-sized “but” — NASCAR announced that the two cars had pushed the envelope as far as it could be pushed. “While both cars passed post-race inspection, we informed the 48 and 5 they were extremely close on some of the tolerances,” NASCAR said in a statement.

In essence, what NASCAR did was raise a huge and very public red flag about the two Hendrick cars, the very two cars that have utterly dominated the Chase for the Sprint Cup and are threatening to run away with it, just two races in.

Usually, if something legal but skirting the edge comes up, it’s handled internally — a crew chief or an engineer will be told behind closed doors not to show up next week with this part or that part that was discovered in inspection. And if it really is something illegal, NASCAR has cracked down hard on people since the introduction of the COT. That includes Hendrick crew chiefs Chad Knaus and Steve Letarte, who each earned six-week suspensions two years ago for improperly tweaking the front fenders on the 48 and 24 at Infineon Raceway.

Again — and this is the most important thing to understand — is that NASCAR declared the 48 and 5 legal after Dover.

And every single crew chief, mechanic and gofer in the garage knows the job of a team is to work to the limit of the rules. When the rulebook says the car has to weigh 3,450 pounds, teams build the cars to weigh as close to 3,450 pounds as possible. They don’t build the cars to weigh 3,800 pounds just to be on the safe side during inspection.

So why in the world would NASCAR simultaneously declare the 48 and 5 legal and then raise a big flag about them being close to illegal?

There are a couple of reasons.

First, it sends a message to the competition and to the fans that NASCAR is paying close attention in inspection and that the winning cars are, in fact, legal.

Second, NASCAR has a long history of spending extra time tearing down cars that win too often.


Page 1 of 2
Prev
12
Next
tom_jensen's avatar

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Tom Jensen

MORE BY THIS AUTHOR
Advertising | Jobs | Feedback | FAQ | Terms of Use | NEW Privacy Policy | Ad Choices | Site Map
Fox Sports | FUEL TV | FX Network | National Geographic | IGN | AskMen
The Motor Sports Authority, SPEED and associated logos are registered trademarks of Speed Channel Inc.
All Rights Reserved © Speed Channel, Inc. 2012

All external links will open in a new browser window. SPEED.com does not endorse external sites.