NASCAR meets with Knaus about comments he made before Dega race

NASCAR officials met with Chad Knaus and Jimmie Johnson on Friday at Martinsville to discuss Knaus' instructions to Johnson before last weekend's race at Talladega.

SBNation reported this week that Knaus told Johnson to damage the rear of his car if he won the race. SBNation acquired an audio clip of the conversation between Knaus and Johnson before the race as Knaus leaned his head into the car to talk. The conversation was picked up on NASCAR.com’s RaceBuddy via a mic inside the car and aired online.

“You don't have to have to hit it hard, you don't have to destroy it,’’ Knaus told Johnson, according to the SBNation report. “But you've gotta do a donut and you've gotta hit the back end, or somebody's gotta hit you in the ass-end or something. OK?"

UPDATE

About NASCAR's meeting with Knaus and Johnson, NASCAR spokesperson Kerry Tharp said: "We met with them for a few minutes up in the hauler, just wanted to get Chad's take on what he meant in those comments. We felt like it was our due diligence to look into it, get some insight, clarification from him because we want to do everything we possibly can to make sure that the entire garage area ... the playing field is as level as possible from a competition standpoint with all the inspection processes that we have. They understand that, they know that. We made our point. We listened. Race is over and done with but we wanted to have a conversation with him in particular.

 

And moving forward, Johnson's car is likely to be sent to the R&D Center after a race more often for further inspection?

Tharp: "It could grace our building a little bit more often. Sure. That's not unusual. We've done that in the past.''

 

 

Here was my conversation with John Darby, Cup series director earlier in the day before the meeting...

So, what will NASCAR do about this?

I asked Darby that since NASCAR typically reacts more toward actions than intentions what was there to do?

DARBY: “I guess the most difficult part of even thinking about a reaction is because at best it’s speculative. Did Chad tell Jimmie that? Yeah, there’s no denying that. But nobody knows the reason why, nobody knows if there was or wasn’t an issue with the race car; if it was the double-throwdown super car and 26th is the best it could run, then you’ve got to ask yourself, “OK, was the extra work worth it.’ You can get snarled up in that as deep as you want to take it.

WILL YOU TALK TO CHAD ABOUT WHAT HE SAID?

DARBY: “I’m sure sometime.

WHAT WILL BE THE POINT OF THE DISCUSSION?

DARBY: “Maybe it’s no more than trying to gather information. What I do know and typically what we talk about and react to are the facts, the car went through three inspections at the race track with no issues and that’s all I can really look at for right now.’’

DOES THIS MAKE YOU CONSIDER RE-EXAMINIG THE INSPECTION PROCESS?

 “No. With what we do and taking cars back (to the R&D Center) every week, obviously, we can’t take all 43 cars back and get to the finite measurement and inspections that we do, but every car out there is subject to that every Sunday. You can’t calculate when you’re number is going to come up, you know what I mean? I’m comfortable with that. I think our inspection process from what we do at track to following through what happens on Tuesday (further inspection at R&D Center) and just looking at the numbers of cars that go through there and just about everybody is going to get caught up in that sometime during the year. I’m satisfied with our process. I think it’s very accurate. It’s as technical as it needs to be. I think the results show that.

(NOTE: In 2009, I followed a car through the inspection process at the R&D Center. Here's what happens.)

IT IS NASCAR’S RIGHT TO SELECT WHICH CAR IT WANTS AS A RANDOM FOR FURTHER INSPECTION. I DON’T THINK IT WOULD SURPRISE MANY PEOPLE IF JOHNSON’S CAR WAS SELECTED AS A RANDOM ANYTIME SOON

DARBY: “You guys are catching on. I’m telling you.’’

IN THE PAST YOU BROUGHT JOHNSON’SCAR, AMONG OTHERS TO THE R&D CENTER, WHEN THEY GOT CLOSE TO TOLERANCES. MIGHT THAT BE A REASON TO BRING THAT CAR BACK IN SOON?

“That resulted in a situation and the 48 is not the only car we’ve done with. If we’ve had cars that have been extremely close or something, yes, we can bring them back multiple weeks to make sure everything gets lined up. (Clint Bowyer) last year was a similar situation. It’s helpful.’’

 

 

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