Submitted by NASCAR Ranting and Raving Blog
NASCAR’s official statement on declaring the winner as Tony Stewart is, according to Mike Helton, “During the last lap of [Sunday’s] race at Talladega Superspeedway the driver of the No. 01 violated NASCAR policy by driving under the yellow line to improve his position. In NASCAR’s opinion he was not forced below the yellow line. NASCAR correctly took immediate action to enforce the policy by penalizing the No. 01 and scoring the No. 20 as the race winner.”
This NASCAR policy was issued in a written statement during the drivers meeting prior to the race at Talladega, which reads as follows;
“This is your warning: race above the yellow line. If, in NASCAR’s judgment, you go below the yellow line to improve your position, you will be black-flagged. If in NASCAR’s judgment you force someone below the yellow line (in an effort to stop him from passing you), you may be black-flagged.” - source nascar.com
The black flagged part is where it gets interesting. Since the number 01 car was penalized and he was on the last lap he was placed at the tail-end of the lead lap, in this case 18th. Why there? Because “… (Smith) improved his position and the penalty for that is a pass-through, so he was moved back to the tail end of the longest line [of the cars on the lead lap] or the 18th position,” NASCAR’s vice president of corporate communications Jim Hunter said in a post-race statement.
Well there you have it, like it or not, but I’ve gotta know, in the realm of public opinion, who do you think the winner really is?
For some reason Blogger won’t let me put a poll field and picture field in the same post so here is the picture from the above post.
Photo Credit: (autostock) nascar.com
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