Getting us all up to speed on rules for today........
NASCAR has changed two pit-road rules, one to keep drivers from being penalized when they are not at fault and another to keep drivers from exploiting the rules.
The changes, which apply to the Sprint Cup, Nationwide and Camping World Truck series, were revealed by NASCAR officials Thursday during a session to go over pit-road rules with select media.
A driver can no longer speed down pit road to avoid being lapped. In the past, if a driver needed repairs to his car on pit road, the team would work as long as possible and then the driver would speed down pit road to remain on the lead lap. The penalty would send him to the tail end of the longest line – where the driver would be anyway because the time spent on pit road would put him at the back of the field.
Now a driver caught speeding down pit road in an attempt to beat the caution car would either be held at the end of pit road or be forced to stop on the track and give the lap back.
The other change involves a situation in which a driver crosses the pit-road commitment line under green but then the yellow flag comes out before the driver hits the pit-road entrance line where the green/red light is located. Now, instead of being penalized, the driver can continue down pit road – even though the pits are technically closed – as long as the driver does not pit. The driver would be put back in line where the car was when it entered pit road.
In the past, drivers were penalized – either for coming back on the track after crossing the commitment line or for entering pit road when the pits were closed.
...don’t forget the use of a LARGER restrictor plate this year at Daytona...don’t know if that will apply to Tally or not, probably depends on how much carnage happens at Daytona!~
Thank you.
#2 is a no brainer and needs to be implemented but I have questions on #1. Say a guy (or gal :) gets in a wreck and trys the old stopping every lap to get his car repaired. He then speeds down pit road and gets the penalty to put him in the back of the longest line. Is the penalty the same the 2nd or 3rd time he does it..he just gets put back on the end of the longest line? Is there an additional penalty for the 2nd or 3rd violation?
We need to clarify this for Tubebender because his drivers will undoubtably try to circumvent the rules and we need to be perfectly clear on this.