Cheating or not ...

[RaceFanStan]

from nascar.com :

#1 Cup car FAILED Daytona inspection & NASCAR impounded the car !
Daytona Beach, FL - July 3, 2008
A black #1 Chevrolet belonging to DEI sat under a car cover in the auxiliary garage area at Daytona ...
& with it the Chase hopes* for Martin Truex Jr could also be gone ...
NASCAR officials impounded Truex's Sprint Cup car after it repeatedly failed pre-practice technical inspection.
According to NASCAR spokesman Kerry Tharp, the car's roof did not fit the mandatory templates.

*It's unknown at this time what fines and penalties may be assessed against owner & driver.
After finishing 4th last week at Loudon, Truex is currently 14th in the standings ...
(1,945 points, 71 points behind Kevin Harvick, who is 12th with 9 races remaining before the Chase.)

NOTE : Earlier this season, NASCAR impounded the cars of Scott Riggs and Johnny Sauter ...
it was before practice at Charlotte for having wing-mount violations.
Each driver was penalized 150 points.
A similar penalty would drop Truex to 17th. :s

[colinspooky]

shame, but it astounds me that a team could get something like that wrong - more than once if it repeatedly failed inspection.

Perhaps NASCAR is changing the template each time they go back in. Or not.

Maybe it's time the templates were kept the same so the teams some how knew what shape their cars need to be BEFORE they arrive at the track.


















irony warning

[RaceFanStan]

At Daytona most teams look for all the aero tweaks they can make while still staying within the rules ...
many teams will walk dangerously close to the edge of a gray area in the rulebook ...
sometimes they are found to have to stepped over the line & they earn themselves a penalty ...
the #1 team didn't deliberately break any rules, they pushed the limits & they got burned this time ...
they were only trying to get the #1 car as fast as they could "legally" ... :eek:

(Truex's team-mates qualified 1st & 2nd while Truex in a back-up car could only qualify 35th) :eek:

[MD24]

Had this been RCR, I would definitely say yes.

But in this case I think it's just plain stupidity.

[harvick#1]

:rolleyes: :p :

and if it was Hendrick, I wouldn't be at all surprised :p :

[oldhippie]

all teams look for every advantage they can get while staying inside the rules
some of the teams are just bolder than others when bending the rules

[colinspooky]

many teams will walk dangerously close to the edge of a gray area in the rulebook ...



Not so grey really - I bow to your superior knowledge on this, but don't they have that crate thing they lower on to the cars to measure everything.
Surely these dimensions are known to the teams well in advance of arrival at any track. If the car doens't fit this crate, they made the car wrong. If it does fit, they are in. No grey areas surely - just use a ruler and get the measurements right.



\ I would be so hopeless at that - I can't even measure for a shelf. :D
\\ grey/gray - language is such a grey area sometimes. ;)