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Penalties ~ DW Had A Better Idea 04/11/2017 David Nance |
Author’s Note-This article was started
after the 2016 Homestead race but was shelved when I saw something else shiny
and moved to other things. However recent developments breathed new life into
it again, so sit back and enjoy the revived article entitled...
As
everyone who knows anything about the sport, 2017 is a watershed year in the
Premier Series. Everything has changed
and the changes are so numerous I can't even list them here. There is one
however that I would like to mention today and that's the new penalty system.
I
applaud the concept of shortening the time between violation detection and
assessing the penalty. Borrowing from the NFL, if they throw a flag, the
penalty is assessed immediately. They don't wait till the following
Tuesday to penalize the offender.
I
kinda like that.
However,
a better solution to pre-race rules violations was offered up a dozen years
ago... a penalty system so innovative it is almost perfect.
It
came from maybe the unlikeliest of sources - three time Cup Champ and FOX
broadcaster Darrell Waltrip. Though not
a DW fan, for me to publicly admit I'm agreeing with Darrell Waltrip on
anything is just short of miraculous.
Though not a fan of his, I am still a race fan and because of that I can
give him credit when he says something that I believe is right and will help
the sport.
For
this I'm sure, if you are on the east side of Beaver Dam KY you can hear my dad
spinning in his grave faster than an Ingersoll-Rand Thunder Gun air wrench on a
money stop.
In
a very hot place somewhere south of Frankfort I'm sure the temperature dropped
noticeably... and I'm not talking Talladega here.
I
told you 2017 was a year of change.
DW's
solution actually goes back a few years, a dozen to be exact. It’s only
coming back to light now because of the new changes in the penalty system and some recent developments
such as we saw at Texas last weekend.
For
a clearer explanation it would be helpful to see its genesis. It was March 2005. The series had just
rolled through Las Vegas and what happened in Vegas didn't stay in Vegas.
Three races into the new Cup season and it left there in an absolute
mess.
After
post-race inspection the Vegas race bore a striking resemblance to that old
children’s story "The Three Bears". Post-race found winner
Jimmie Johnson's car was tooooo tall. Second
place Kyle Busch's car was toooo low. Fifth
place finisher Kevin Harvick's car was juuuust right ... except he'd been busted days earlier for
showing up at qualification with his gas tank rigged to look as though it was
full, while it actually only held just enough fuel for the qualification run.
Vegas
was a mess and no one, especially the Sanctioning Body was happy about it.
When
the dust settled, NASCAR levied the following penalties against the Hendrick
team:
Johnson's
crew chief, Chad Knaus (remember those names), and Busch's crew chief, Alan
Gustafson each received a two-race suspension and were fined $35,000 and
$25,000 respectively. Drivers and owners were fined 25 points.
Childress'
team on the other hand received the following penalties:
Harvick's
crew chief and unrepentant gadgeteer, Todd Barrier
received a four-race suspension and was fined $25,000. Harvick and owner Richard
Childress were each fined 25 points.
All
appealed the penalties. In their wisdom, (insert sarcasm here) the NASCAR
Appeals Board lifted the suspensions on the Hendrick teams, placing Knaus
and Gustafson on 90 days probation. They upheld the penalties against
Childress' team in full, even though Richard argued theirs should be lighter
because their infraction took place before the race and had no impact on the
race results, unlike the Hendrick teams who broke the rules during the race and
whose violations probably had an impact on the race.
The
resultant outcry was understandable and severe. Folks were calling for the win
and second place to be taken away from those offending drivers and given to the
third place and hopefully first compliant driver, Kurt Busch.
Others
called for the suspension of the entire Childress team and parking the car for
several races. Cheaters should be punished, they cried and what was meted
out hardly fit the "crime" nor acted as a future deterrent. NASCAR
was taking a major PR hit at a time in the season when it could least afford
it.
It
was then that a solution came from the unlikely source. Darrell Waltrip
suggested something that if implemented would have not only addressed the Las
Vegas fiasco, but possibly address all pre-race "cheating".
DW's
solution was simple. Instead of forcing the team to fix the issue before
they could get back on the track to practice or penalize them with reduced
practice times, points or fines, he proposed to not allow offenders to correct
their situations until the green flag dropped and the race started. Then
and only then would they be allowed to correct the situation and only after
they corrected the situation could they return to the track.
Brilliant! Absolutely
brilliant!
If
DW's rule had been in place in 2005, then once the rigged tank was found,
NASCAR officials would have forbidden Harvick's team
from correcting the situation before the race. The 29 could go out and
practice with their tricked up tank which held maybe two gallons max.
See
what they learn from that. See how
"Happy" Kevin Harvick would have been in all this.
On
race day they would have to start the race with that setup as well, taking the
green with their pitiful two gallons of gas while the rest of the hopefully
more compliant field rolled off with their 22 gallons of valuable fuel.
Then
when the green flag dropped the 29 would be blacked flagged, sent to the pits
(or garage) for Berrier and crew to undo the
offending setup and bring their car back into compliance, all while the rest of
the field was logging laps under green.
The
beauty of this is that in Harvick's case it would
have been impossible to swap out a gas tank and go back through inspection
without losing many, many, many laps. Their penalty would have been
commensurate with the amount of work they put into the cheat. The
"fine" automatically fit the "crime" and they, not NASCAR
would set it.
Under
DW's proposal, Harvick's ability to match his
eventual fifth place finish would have been impossible and the 25 point penalty
eventually tacked on by NASCAR, that fans criticized for being too light, would
have automatically been even more severe.
And
if that wasn't enough of a deterrent to playing fast and loose with the rules,
the embarrassment to them and their sponsors, coupled with all the negative PR
and loss of potential TV exposure might cause folks who are highly dependent on
those sponsorship dollars to think twice before they got cute and tried to
circumvent the rules.
I'm
sure if this had of been in place in 2005, Richard Childress would have
received a call from Goodwrench that following Monday (if not sooner), voicing
their displeasure at seeing their car sitting on pit road lap after lap as the
competitors passed them by. How everyone in the stands and at home knew
they cheated and how Goodwrench was now "branded" as such. How
their fans had to hide their Goodwrench garb on the walk back to their cars to
keep from getting heckled by competitors’ fans after the race.
The
ramifications would have been great. It probably wouldn't happen again,
which is hopefully the desired deterrent effect NASCAR is trying to obtain
through their latest rule changes.
His
solution was pure. Simple. Effective. And
cost nothing. And I believe it would work as well today as when DW first
suggested it. And that's why... I... agree... with... him... on it.
You
don't know how hard that was to say.
As
I reflected on this, I wonder where ol' DW came up with this. Is he that
wise? Well, he has won a lot of races, made a lot of money and has a nice
job, but from his performances in the booth, you'd not think that was the case.
Or
maybe it was that because he talks sooo much and for sooo long that eventually he was bound to say something
that made sense. Sort of the old blind squirrel and acorn scenario.
I
think it is neither. I think he looked at the situation and reflected on
his career and asked himself as a racer, what would be the harshest punishment
that could be levied. And that would be to be at the track, in the car capable
of winning and have to sit and watch while your crew fixed something silly that
you or they had chosen to do, knowing your chance to win had vanished.
I
think as he looked at Berrier's trick tank, he probably
first admired the ingenuity and work that went into it, wished he or Hammond
had thought of it first (or maybe they had and never got caught) and then
thought how much of a pain it would have been to have to sit there and watch
them rip it out only to fix the car as it should have been when it lined up to
qualify and knowing that would cost him a shot at a win.
He
may have broken into a cold sweat when he realized how many of his 84 wins he
might not of gotten if he had been forced to "uncheat"
the car before he could continue the race. How many laps would he have
lost filling the frame rails back up with buckshot to bring the car back up to
minimum weight after dumping them, 'Bombs away" in the first turn of the
first lap.
How
many times would he have to pit to fill the front springs back up with charcoal
briquettes to get the ride height back into compliance (he was not alone on
this one; one writer wrote that on race day at the inside of the first turn at
Darlington there was enough charcoal there to barbecue a mule), or laps lost to
rip the trick front setup out and replace it with a legal one?
How
much he would have disliked riding around all day without a radio, no
connection to his crew chief or spotter, while lugging around a lead look-alike
"radio" that had been placed in the cockpit before inspection to meet
weight limits or how long would he have lasted in practice or would he even
want to practice if he had to wear the lead look-alike "helmet" that
was in his driver's seat when the car went through inspection?
What
about all the laps that would have been lost fixing trick after trick he and
Hammond brought to the track trying to gain an advantage? How many races
can you win in the pits, laps down? Only he knew and maybe that scared
him and he realized just how effective such a rule could be.
Now
fast forward to Homestead 2016. Before the start of the final race, the
race of races for the whole enchilada (no offense to enchiladas), three of the
four Chase competitors failed pre-race inspection, including eventual race
winner and seven-time Champion Jimmie Johnson.
Remember him? A dozen years ago
he was that Las Vegas "winner" whose car was toooo
tall. He also had the same crew chief
then as now.
As
I look back I wonder, would we have a seven-time champ if DW's solution had
been in place? Could Johnson have won
Homestead and the Championship if Chad Knaus had to wait until the green flag
dropped before he could bring the offending A-posts back into compliance? How many laps down would his driver have been
if they then had to take the repaired car back through the inspection process
before being allowed to join the field?
Or would Chad have thought twice before presenting a non-compliant car
for inspection to begin with? We'll
never know.
So,
using this rule how would things play out this season? Harvick's Daytona
500 may have been different. He started
at the rear anyway due to a track-bar infraction found after the qualifying
race. Under the DW rule he would have
not been allowed to correct it, would start the Daytona race at the back with
it and after the race began, would be required to correct it and go back
through inspection before continuing to race.
A 22nd place finish may have been difficult for "Happy" to
obtain under this scenario.
This
week's Texas race might have been different as well. You may recall that numerous teams were
unable to get their cars into compliance before qualifying began and had to go
to the back of the field. This caused
quite an uproar among fans but had little impact on the outcome of the race as
offenders such as Larson nearly won the race-(2 place) and other offenders
turned in nice finishes including Earnhardt Jr. (5th place), Elliott (9th
place) and Kyle
Busch (14th place).
Hardly
a deterrent effect, wouldn't you agree?
And for the rest of the field, what benefit was it to them to do things
right to begin with?
Think
how different the race outcome would have been if the DW rule had been in
effect and on lap two the offenders were black flagged to come into the pits
and bring their cars into compliance before rejoining the race. Reckon this would be an issue with those
teams again? I doubt it... and isn't
that the problem they are trying to solve?
Getting
teams to present compliant cars to the Sanctioning Body for inspection is a
worthy goal. The new rules and stiffer
penalties are a step in that direction.
None of those would be as effective as what DW has outlined - a
self-imposing penalty process to "encourage" teams to abide.
So
the solution is out there. Now it comes
down to just how serious the Sanctioning Body is about it. Is the "Cat and Mouse" aspect of
the sport something we really want to stop or is so woven into our fabric it
can't change? Or is DW's proposal just
too powerful a weapon to be trusted by the Sanctioning Body as it eliminates
almost any of their discretion? Does the
"Sanctioning Body" really want to stop it or is it just a
"wink-wink, nod-nod" "we talk tough but really don't want things
to change" situation?
The
solution has been out there for a dozen years... unadopted. In this case, maybe actions speak louder than
words. What do you think?