A senior NASCAR official has praised the way that Bubba Wallace's 23XI Racing team handled their penalty appeal in the early hours of Monday morning in Atlanta.
Wallace was demoted from second to 29th thanks to a late penalty for improving his position while under the out-of-bounds line at the bottom of the track, a decision his team appealed immediately.
NASCAR vice president of racing communications Mike Forde revealed on the Hauler Talk podcast this week that the team's reaction to the penalty and subsequent (unsuccessful) appeal 'couldn't have been more respectful', praising their professionalism and level-headedness.
The penalty means that Wallace moves 27 points closer to the Chase cut line than he would otherwise have been, from a somewhat sturdy 82 points to a significantly more precarious 55.
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23XI praised for conduct in NASCAR appeal
“(NASCAR vice president of competition) Elton Sawyer said they couldn’t have been more respectful. In the protest, they handled it very, very well. Everyone was level-headed, probably moreso than our folks expected, because it’s a blow.
"It’s a 27-point swing, and where he is on the Chase standings right now, it’s a little bit hairy for him. So they could have probably been guns blazing and really angry, but they handled it in a very professional manner.”
Forde also admitted that the rule – intended to prevent major wrecks – is not a universally popular one, but insisted that racing at those three superspeedways 'probably would be a lot worse without it'.
“It’s unfortunate,” Wallace himself admitted. “If you look at SMT, I was all over the brakes trying to just give the spot back. It says don’t go below the yellow line and gain a position, which I didn’t. I was still third. I got a shove from (Ty Gibbs) to go to second, so technically, no positions were gained in doing that.”
Why was Bubba Wallace penalized at Atlanta?
Forde explained why Wallace's attempt to avoid gaining places didn't make a difference to his punishment, saying: “Unfortunately for Bubba, attempting to give the position back does not matter in this rule.
"If you go below the line and race below the line to improve your position, that’s where it happens. We determined that he did advance his position in a couple of areas.
"At a certain point, if you look at the replays, he’s in first, and it’s the last lap. So if there is a caution, there was a point pretty close to that start/finish line where he would have been declared the winner.
"Now he would have been black-flagged and still gone back to 29th, but certainly in our eyes, he advanced his position at that point. … At some point, he went below the line, and at some point, he did advance his position, and that was all that mattered, whether he intended it or not.”
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