Full Throttle

Dale Earnhardt Jr. has been fined $10,000 and docked 25 championship points for intentionally causing a yellow during last Sunday’s Food City 500.

“The driver of the No. 8 car was quite vocal in admitting he intentionally spun out his car to cause a caution condition on the track, which is clearly prohibited in the NASCAR rule book,” NASCAR president Mike Helton said. “We have several rules that have been in place for quite some time to prevent someone from altering the outcome of an event. This was a clear cut case of that.”

Neither Earnhardt nor the Dale Earnhardt Inc. team could be reached for comment. Gee I wonder why? The monetary fine is peanuts, and the team still maintains third place in the Championship standings. They know they got off light and will forget the incident.

NASCAR, in my opinion, chose to soft peddle the incident rather than impose a real penalty. To send a message they should have assumed Earnhardt remained 1 lap down after 500 laps. That would have placed him in 22nd, the first position that completed 499 laps. As you can see the financial hit would have been larger but, more significantly, the greater loss of points wouldn’t have left any doubts as to NASCAR’S thoughts on the matter.

I’m not stupid enough to believe this stunt hasn’t been pulled in the past, but he got caught red handed, or open miked, if you will. I have this nagging feeling that someone has their eye on the new “PlayOff” type end of the season. The risk one of their biggest draws missing the “playoffs” due to a NASCAR penalty may have clouded their judgement.

Actual finishing positions
11 Dale Earnhardt Jr 8 Chevrolet 500 $118,748, Running
22 Ricky Craven 32 Chevrolet 499 $93,390, Running