Talladega incidents bring ethical standards into question

MARTINSVILLE

A wet Friday kept Sprint Cup cars from practicing at Martinsville Speedway but gave those in the garage extra time to discuss the sport's "rough week on the ethical scale," as Brad Keselowski put it.

With revelations of one manufacturer drafting primarily with only its cars, a crew chief telling his driver to damage the rear of his car if he won and illegal windshields last weekend at Talladega, many questions were raised about the state of the sport. New fans expressed shock, while older fans relished the sport's return to its roots where the saying went "if you ain't cheatin', you ain't tryin'."

NASCAR, though, wasn't enamored with all of it. Series officials met with crew chief Chad Knaus and Jimmie Johnson on Friday to discuss Knaus' orders to the five-time defending series champion before last weekend's race.

SBNation reported that Knaus told Johnson before the race to damage the rear of his car if he won. The connotation being that they could point to the damage if the car did not fall within NASCAR's tolerances in the post-race inspection.

Johnson admitted Friday that "while Chad was trying to protect himself... he made a foolish statement."

Johnson said Knaus had never before made such a request before a race.

Series officials will not penalize Knaus - his car passed all three inspections at Talladega last weekend - but hinted that Johnson's car likely will be selected for further inspection at NASCAR's R&D center after upcoming races. NASCAR typically takes two or three cars, including the winning car, from a race to its facility for further inspection.

What happened on the track at Talladega, though, was what bothered Tony Stewart. He drafted with David Gilliland in previous restrictor-plate races this season but with Ford teams being asked by a Ford executive to help one another when possible, Gilliland changed partners. That edict gained more focus when Trevor Bayne quit drafting with Jeff Gordon on the final restart to work with fellow Ford driver Matt Kenseth after he lost his drafting partner.

"It's starting to get way too political on the race track," Stewart said. "That's not the scenario you want to be in as a driver to try to decide a championship."

Stewart blamed the two-car drafts for creating that atmosphere.

"You saw a distinct deal last week of manufacturers running with each other," he said. "It's become more apparent at what's going on. You can talk to everybody you want to talk to and everybody is going to say, "No, they're not doing this,' or "Yes, they're doing this.' All you've got to do is pause your TV with the field in there, look and see and that pretty much tells the story of what's going on. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out how it's evolving that way because of the two-car draft."

Gordon fell from third to 27th after Bayne dumped him. Gordon said he had multiple conversations with Bayne and that he understood why Bayne went with Kenseth after the final restart but he questioned the strategy.

"I... think it took away an opportunity for Trevor Bayne to win that race by doing that and I told him this," Gordon said. "From a Ford standpoint if he had pushed me... (and) had stayed in behind me I think we could have battled those two guys up there for the lead and then he could have dumped me coming to the line.

"I think this whole manufacturer thing, all of us have to be careful with saying we cannot work with them because you might take away the possibility of you winning the race for your manufacturer by being too strict with those guidelines. If I feel like on the last lap restart I can push a Toyota to get to the front and then leave him out coming to the line, I think that's a win for me and for our manufacturer. I used (another manufacturer) to get me there, so I think that's even an added bonus."

There were no such bonuses at Talladega but many questions. Five days later, answers were few as NASCAR waded through a dirty week.