NASCAR fines Austin Hill team after Xfinity race at Indy
NASCAR Xfinity Series driver Austin Hill had a strong showing at Indianapolis Motor Speedway on Saturday, but his team was penalized. According to Bob Pockrass of Fox Sports, Hill’s No. 21 car had one loose lugnut. It led to Hill’s crew chief being hit with a monetary fine.
Hill, who won the Xfinity Series regular season title in 2023, finished sixth in the Pennzoil 250. He has finished in the top 10 in the last four races and has earned 13 top-10 finishes this season, including victories at Daytona and Atlanta.
Despite the success this season, Hill’s team is no stranger to being hit with penalties. At the Sonoma race, Hill’s crew chief, Andy Street was fined 5,000 for one loose lug nut, similar to the incident this past weekend. Hill was also fined $25,000 and was docked 25 points in the Xfinity Series driver standings for wrecking Cole Custer at the Charlotte race in May.
“Well just watching the replay, the replay’s not the greatest,” Hill said about the incident, via Dustin Albino. “They did a really good job showing everything that went on, not really. But, yeah I just came off of four, everybody’s on old tires, scuffs when we came in an pitted and I’m like in a slide trying to stay off of him. I mean his right rear barely might have skimmed the wall, didn’t hurt his car any.
Austin Hill explains incident with Cole Custer at Charlotte
“Then he completely lost his mind down the fronstretch. Doored me so hard that it cut the right front down. But getting into one, I didn’t really know the right front was down yet and I drive into one really deep because I’m going to drive in with him and right front was down and it’s not going to turn, right? So, got into him and then I probably got a little too carried away down the backstretch I didn’t let him go.”
Hill continued: “So that part I apologize about. But I don’t apologize about racing him off of four. I do not know what he’s mad about. It’s not like he slammed the wall really hard or messed his car up any.”
Hill, 30, drives for Richard Childress Racing and has competed in three Cup Series races this season. In his Cup Series career, Hill has started nine races and his best finish was P14 at the Coke Zero Sugar 400 at Daytona last year.