June 24, 2007
By Kim Roberson

Kim Roberson

You know, I thought about mid-week this past week ‘What are we going to talk about for the next few weeks?’ The ‘where is Junior going to go’ quiz was over, Michael Waltrip is making races on speed (and we have almost stopped asking what was in his engine at Daytona), Carl’s hauler driver, aka Tom the Yeti, finally got to shave after the No. 99 won the race last week, and the Jeff baby-watch came to an end Wednesday with the healthy arrival of Miss Ella Sophia Gordon. All the hot topics that have seemingly occupied the top of the NASCAR newswires over the last two or three months were finally coming to an end.

Time to sit back and have a nice, quiet weekend where we just focus on racing, right?

Yeah, right.

I had my column all mapped out and ready to go on Friday morning when my NEXTEL phone beeped with a NASCAR.com alert: Breaking News: Johnson and Gordon fail pre-race inspection.

Dangit. There went the promise of a quiet weekend…and my column about the nice quiet weekend.

In reading through the information and watching Speed Channel on Friday, it seems it was pretty apparent when the cars were presented for inspection there was going to be a problem with the fenders. It is an area not “touched” by one of the new templates, and as such, Steve Letarte and the 24 team, and Chad Knaus and the 48 team, apparently felt that gave them permission to play with it.

They were sorely mistaken.

"It's important to know that this is a Car of Tomorrow penalty," said NASCAR’s spokesman Ramsey Poston. "That's why we brought the reams to the R&D center earlier this year -- to go through this very specific process with them, to let them know that we're going to keep the Car of Tomorrow vehicles, the new vehicles, in check. Today when you look at the current cars, the spoiler cars, clearly these are twisted cars. They've been able to run wild with the gray areas. We're going to shut that down, and we're going to keep this car in check so it's better for everybody."

"We felt we understood what the process was as far inspecting these cars, and what was OK and what was not OK," Doug Duchardt, vice president of Hendrick Motorsports, said on Friday. "Obviously, it would be irresponsible of us to take excessive risk and put ourselves in this position. We felt like we could work in between those templates. That was our understanding. Obviously, we didn't understand that correctly, and we found out the hard way."

Looking at what happened to the No. 8 team for installing the wrong brackets at Darlington six weeks ago, one can imagine that the penalties to be handed down on Tuesday for the No. 24 and No. 48 teams will be equally, if not more harsh. When asked if Knaus’ past history with NASCAR’s “grey” area will impact him more than Letarte, Poston commented “We don’t live in a vacuum”, implying they are well aware that Chad has a history of pushing the envelope, and the NASCAR inspectors buttons.

As if to add to the neon “guilty” finger pointing to the No. 24 and No. 48, the fact that the No. 5 and No. 25 had no problems whatsoever getting through inspection with their cars. Remember, the No. 24 and No. 48 share a facility, and the No. 5 and No. 25 share another.

I bet Jeff Gordon was wishing Friday night as he sat in his hotel suite, that someone had let him in on the plans so he could spend an extra day at home with Ingrid and baby Ella instead of twiddling his thumbs with nothing to do at the track.

If parity holds true, Chad and Steve will be spending the next six races…including the all-important Pepsi 400…at home watching the race on TV instead of on top of the pit box. Ironically, Tony Eury Jr. will be returning from his COT-based punishment next weekend. (If he had another week, the three of them could have found a fourth and played a game of poker while watching the race at NHIS next week.)

Knaus, who has been parked for each of the last two years (two weeks in 2005 and four weeks last year), could find that he is wishing for just six weeks for his punishment.

When NASCAR didn’t suspend Kurt Busch for his incident with Tony Stewart on pit road, they said it was because he hadn’t been in trouble with them in over a year.

Well, with 11 fines or penalties in six years as CC for the No. 48, NASCAR doesn’t need a long memory to remember the last time Chad was in the hauler facing John Darby and Mike Helton. If memory and severity are the mitigating factors in how NASCAR decides how long to park a Crew Chief, then Chad might as well get comfy in his recliner.

The worst part of all of this is that it is taking away from what has been an otherwise stellar year for the HMS teams. The No. 24 is in the points lead, with the No. 48 in third. The No. 25 has won a race, and they just signed Dale Earnhardt Junior to take over the No. 5 next year, who also has won a race in 2007.

Oh yeah….Jeff Gordon welcomed Ella Sophia into his world this week, too. And what appeared to be the perfect chance for him to relax and win one for his little girl is turning into a weekend where he probably wishes he had let Mark Martin just take the wheel and drive while he stayed home with his new family.

The biggest indicator of how big this is, to me at least, is the reaction of my friends who are No. 24 and No. 48 fans.

“Wow, I can't believe they would risk a penalty for this. Not only the No. 48 team, but especially the No. 24. I hope they stay consistent with the penalties and hammer them like they have the others. This is so disappointing” said Krystal, a HUGE No. 48 fan.

Anne, one of the biggest No. 24 fans I know, said “They best get the same (punishment) as everyone else has gotten. Pisses me off to no end but fair is fair.”

Tuesday is going to be interesting, to say the very least. I’ll be in Oklahoma City at a meeting, but I am hoping the little beep on my phone will go off and let me know just what NASCAR has decided.

Maybe next week we can go back to whatever seemed to be a nice, normal, quiet weekend for NASCAR fans. It has been so long since we had one of those, I am beginning to forget what they were like.

The thoughts and ideas expressed by this writer or any other writer on Insider Racing News, are not necessarily the views of the staff and/or management of IRN.