Why NASCAR Came Down Hard on Hendrick, But Let William Byron's Phoenix Win Stand

A voluntary inspection of Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolets by NASCAR at Phoenix Raceway has apparently backfired on the organization, resulting in the stiffest penalties ever assessed by the sanctioning body.

The Background

Every weekend, NASCAR conducts pre-qualifying, pre-race, and post-race inspections with different penalty levels for when infractions are discovered.

A post-race inspection infraction may result in a victory being taken from a driver, such as occurred last year at Pocono Raceway when NASCAR disqualified Denny Hamlin and runner-up Kyle Busch.

If someone fails pre-race inspection multiple times, that team may lose practice time at a future event.

The Phoenix Timeline

When the teams arrived at Phoenix Raceway last weekend, NASCAR gave the Cup teams 50 minutes of practice on Friday so they could adapt to the new rules that eliminated 30% of the cars’ downforce.

Thirty-five minutes after the garage opened on Friday and prior to on-track activity, NASCAR took hood louvers from the Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolets during a voluntary inspection. In a statement issued Wednesday, Hendrick Motorsports said NASCAR took possession of the louvers approximately four hours later with no prior communication. The louvers that were taken were replaced and all four cars were deemed legal by NASCAR for qualifying and the race, which is why taking away William Byron's win was not an option for NASCAR.

On Wednesday, NASCAR announced the the penalties that involved all four Hendrick teams and Kaulig Racing’s No. 31 team. They were for the modification of hood louvers, which fall under a single source vendor supplied part.

Louvers were taken from the No. 31 car during pre-qualifying inspection. NASCAR maintains the teams altered a single source vendor supplied part which became illegal with the Next Gen car.

The Penalties

The crew chiefs for the car Nos. 5, 9, 24, 48 and 31 (Cliff Daniels, Alan Gustafson, Ryan Fugle, Blake Harris and Trent Owens) were each fined $100,000 and suspended from the next four NASCAR Cup point races. Each team and driver (Kyle Larson, Josh Berry substituting for Chase Elliott, Byron, Alex Bowman and Justin Haley) will lose 100 points as well as each driver losing 10 playoff points.

With it being so early in the season, Byron is the only driver that will lose any significant amount of playoff points. Byron, who won two of the season’s first four races, now has three playoff points instead of 13. Larson possessed only one playoff point after the Phoenix race while the other Hendrick drivers as well as Kaulig Racing’s Haley had none.

The Appeal

Hendrick Motorsports said Wednesday in a prepared statement that it was “disappointed” with NASCAR’s penalties that were the stiffest ever assessed by the sanctioning body and it would appeal.

“We are disappointed with today’s decision by NASCAR to issue penalties and have elected to appeal based on a variety of facts,” Hendrick said in the statement.