NASCAR’s Elton Sawyer clarifies damaged vehicle policy after Talladega chaos
NASCAR‘s damaged vehicle policy has come under fire in light of the controversy coming out of Sunday’s Round of 12 race at Talladega.
After the “Big One” with five laps remaining in the race, in which a record 28 cars were involved, several cars were stranded in the infield of Turn 3. Under the policy adopted in 2017, drivers who leave their cars are ineligible to finish the race. That forced playoff drivers Chase Elliott and Chase Briscoe to remain inside their cars in hopes of getting back to pit road to undergo minimal repairs. NASCAR gave both a tow back to pit road, and they were able to get back out on the racetrack and meet minimum speed.
“I have never seen a more disorganized deal in my life,” Briscoe said, per Jordan Bianchi of The Athletic.
The sanctioning body has previously said that under the DVP, unless you have four flat tires, a tow back to pit road would mean your race is over. That didn’t happen in this case, leading to mass chaos and confusion inside the garage and among the competitors. Elton Sawyer, NASCAR senior vice president of competition, added context to the DVP during a Tuesday appearance on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.
“With that program and with that policy, we’ve said that we were gonna take a deeper dive into it in the offseason just to make sure it’s still providing the efficiencies, it’s still providing the benefits that we want from that,” Sawyer said. “But be also able to correct some things that obviously hasn’t worked as well with that policy that we’ve liked. Our goal from day one when this policy came into place was not to put good cars or good trucks out of the race.
“The way we’ve executed that over the last three years — the policy hasn’t changed. There’s been time that we have towed vehicles back to pit road to be able to correct their issues. There’s a very small list of things you can change once you get back there. Toe links is one of them. The cars that we did tow back this past weekend were able to make those modifications. Get back out on the racetrack and meet minimum speed.”
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The “Big One” at Talladega causes mass confusion with NASCAR damaged vehicle policy
In the moment, several drivers expressed their confusion with the DVP. That included Joey Logano, whose No. 22 Ford sustained enough damage that he was unable to finish the race. Logano took aim at NASCAR for the chaos, describing the scene in Turn 3 as “comical” and “goofy.”
“I don’t know yet,” said Logano, when asked if there was an issue with the lift system on his car. “I didn’t feel it go up, but I had some stuff broken too. So, it’s kind of hard to say if the lift system worked or not. But it’s kind of comical. I get out of the car. And I just see a bunch of cars that after a red flag we’ve been sitting there for 10 minutes. Everyone’s just sitting there hoping they can roll a little bit. It’s just goofy.”
Josh Berry, one of the many drivers involved in the wreck, sarcastically called out NASCAR.
“All I know, is that all those cars parked in Turn 3 better not get towed to pit road buddy. Because that’d be breaking the Damaged Vehicle Policy,” Berry said. “Fu*king 42 cars out there doing burnouts, slinging rubber all over the safety workers trying to get going. But if you have four flat tires and you get towed to pit road, you’re done right?”