Still on the outside looking in. Austin Dillon was hoping that an appeals panel would reinstate him to the NASCAR playoffs, after the sport penalized him following his bull-in-a-china-shop win at Richmond two weeks ago. It was a fairly uneventful race, with the first caution not coming until 2 laps to go. Dillon, who came into the race sitting at 32nd in the points and needing a win to make the playoffs, was headed towards a major upset - until Ryan Preece and Ricky Stenhouse brought out the yellow flag and set up an overtime finish. The field came down pit road, and Dillon managed to maintain the lead while Joey Logano came out 2nd and Denny Hamlin in 3rd. On the final restart, Logano managed to get by the #3 car and looked to be on his way to keeping Richard Childress Racing out of victory lane. But as they went into turn 3 on the final lap, Dillon decided to dive bomb Logano and put the bumper to him, sending the #22 spinning and opening the door for a drag race between Hamlin and Dillon for the victory. Or so it seemed... Dillon wasn't going to be denied from winning his first race since August 2022, and hooked Hamlin in the right rear to also send the #11 car into the outside wall. https://twitter.com/NASCARONFOX/status/1822803195564884048 The end result was Dillon took the iconic #3 to victory lane - and pissed off Logano and Hamlin. In his postrace interviews, the driver of the #22 Team Penske car had some harsh words for Dillon:
"It's chickenshit, there's no doubt about it. He's four car lengths back, not even close, then he wrecks the 11 to go along with it. And then he's going to go up there and thank God and praise everything with his baby. It's a bunch of BS. It's not even freakin' close. Dude, I get it, bump and run, I get it. I didn't back up the corner at all. He came in there and just drove through me. It's ridiculous that that's the way we race. I get bump and runs. I do that. I would expect it. But from 4 car lengths back he was never going to make the corner. And then he wrecks the other car, he wrecks the 11 to go with it. What a piece of crap." https://twitter.com/MrMatthew_CFB/status/1822804372650086691 He wasn't done yet though:
"He's a piece of crap. He sucks. He's sucked his whole career, and now he's going to be in the playoffs." https://twitter.com/Noah_Lewis1/status/1822807435188273335 And while Hamlin wasn't quite as heated, he obviously felt the same way: https://twitter.com/PRNlive/status/1822804745687371907 But it wasn't just the drivers involved in the wild finish who were disgusted by how it all went down. Drivers like Bubba Wallace, Ross Chastain and Tyler Reddick all expressed their displeasure with Dillon's move and what it means for the sport going forward. Obviously drivers feel that it sets a bad precedent if NASCAR allows drivers to just right rear somebody into the wall for a win - not to mention the safety concerns if that happens at a bigger track. With the exception of Richard Childress and his RCR employees, as well as the few Austin Dillon fans out there, everybody seemed to be in agreement that Dillon went too far, and expected NASCAR to issue some sort of penalty for his actions. And they came down HARD. NASCAR announced last week that they revoked the automatic playoff berth that Dillon would have earned from the win, meaning that his win at Richmond will not count towards eligibility for the playoffs. (Generally, a driver who wins a race is automatically in the playoffs). The powers that be found that Dillon "violated its playoff eligibility rule" and therefore the win won't count - though if he manages to win another race, he could still get in. In addition, Dillon was docked 25 points, and his spotter Brandon Benesch was suspended for 3 races after audio emerged of the spotter screaming for Dillon to "wreck him" as he approached Hamlin. https://twitter.com/ryanpistana/status/1822811145457049942 Of course his Richard Childress Racing team wasn't happy with the penalty, and immediately announced that they would appeal NASCAR's ruling in hopes of getting their driver back in the playoffs. Well, that didn't work either. After having his appeal heard today, the National Motorsports Appeals Panel upheld NASCAR's penalty, agreeing that Dillon crossed a line with his move to win the race:
"NASCAR represents elite motorsports and, as such, its drivers are expected to demonstrate exemplary conduct if its series’ championships are to be validated. In this case, the ‘line’ was crossed." The panel did, however, reduce the suspension for spotter Brandon Benesch from 3 races to just one race, meaning that Dillon will have his regular spotter back on the rooftop this weekend at Daytona. RCR once again expressed their disappointment after their appeal was denied, and vowed to appeal the decision of the panel once again:
“Richard Childress Racing is disappointed in the results of today’s hearing in front of the National Motorsports Appeals Panel. We respect the NASCAR appeals process, but we do not believe that today’s outcome reflects the facts presented. We plan to appeal the decision to the Final Appeal Officer.” It's a longshot, but given everything that's on the line, it's no surprise that the team is going to do whatever they can to try to get their driver back in the playoffs. Of course we saw what happened the last time somebody from RCR tried to do whatever they could to get into the playoffs...
Local News
