NASCAR penalties have been issued at Martinsville Speedway
Today, the NASCAR Cup Series will set the championship 4. Martinsville Speedway is set to host the final elimination race ahead of next week’s championship event.
The tensions are high. 8 drivers enter today with a chance at the championship but only 4 will advance.
There’s no qualifying or practice rounds this weekend. However, teams still must pass all inspection stations before taking to the grid.
19 cars failed on their first attempt through the line: Haley, Larson Elliott Wallace, Chastain Reddick Buescher Suarez Briscoe Stenhouse Harvick, Preece Newman McLeod Alfredo Bilicki and Smithley.
However, 18 of those 19 cars were able to pass inspection their second attempt at inspection. Per the rules, none of those cars have been penalized.
Denny Hamlin, the Joe Gibbs Racing No. 11 car was the only car to fail inspection twice. He’s a playoff driver.
The team failed the body inspection on the first attempt. They then failed the rear alignment on the second run through the line.
The team was able to pass on the third attempt. Hamlin will lose his starting spot and drop to the rear.
Related: Martinsville Starting Lineup
NASCAR Inspection Rules
1 Inspection failure: No penalty, the team gets to go to the back of the inspection line and try again.
2 inspection failure: If a team fails twice, NASCAR will send that car to the rear of the field.
3 inspection failures: They have to start at the rear. In addition, the car has to serve a pass through penalty on pit lane at the start of the race.
Typically, NASCAR crew members are ejected on a second failure. However, due to a lack of practice and/or qualifying in recent events, series officials have given less-strict ejections for failed pre-race inspections.
Related: NASCAR TV Schedule (Martinsville)
