Corey LaJoie fails pre-race inspection at Las Vegas, crew member ejected

Bad news for Corey LaJoie and his No. 51 Rick Ware Racing team. The car failed postrace inspection twice and that means penalties. As punishment, NASCAR will not allow the team to have their pit selection and a crew member will be ejected. Likely the car chief.

Have Corey LaJoie and his team gone bankrupt before even getting to the table this weekend? These penalties usually aren’t that big of a deal. A team like No. 51 likely wouldn’t have a great pit stall anyway, if qualifying goes how it has for them this season.

So far through three races in the 51, LaJoie has a best finish of P15. LaJoie’s season-best finish of P4 came all the way back in the Daytona 500.

Not a great start to the weekend.

Pre-race inspection in the NASCAR Cup Series garage is complete.

The No. 51 failed twice (loss of pit selection and crew member ejection).

— Jayski (@jayski) October 19, 2024

Corey LaJoie is in an interesting position. He is the favorite to take control of the 51 car full-time next season. However, he is not guaranteed that ride next season. There is a chance that this is it for LaJoie in the Cup Series, at least in the short term.

That means every race counts. He has to get every position and show that he still belongs in a Cup car. He has sponsorship which helps. Rick Ware Racing also has a lot of in-house sponsors that they can use at times.

So, setbacks like this can be costly. We will see how this affects the 51 team this weekend. Practice and qualifying are coming up from Las Vegas on the USA Network.

Corey LaJoie has had strange season

When it was announced that Justin Haley was headed to Spire Motorsports in 2025, that came with consequences. It appears that Rick Ware Racing and RFK Racing did not appreciate the move too much.

So, they made the decision to move Haley early. Do a driver trade for the rest of the season. Haley is going to be in the No. 7 car full-time next year with Rodney Childers on top of the box as crew chief.

LaJoie was expected to make a leap this season. Spire as a whole was expected to do the same, there is more funding in that building right now than ever. But that hasn’t necessarily led to great results.

Rookies Zane Smith and Carson Hocevar appear to have a better handle on the Next Gen car. Those teams have at times outperformed Corey LaJoie in the same equipment, especially Hocevar. Will the inspection penalty mess with LaJoie on Sunday?