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NASCAR Hits Kevin Harvick And His Team With Major Penalty For Illegal Modifications
Kevin Harvick and his team at Stewart-Haas Racing has been docked 100 points each after Talladega, and his crew chief Rodney Childers was given a hefty fine and four-race suspension.
NASCAR driver Kevin Harvick and his team have been slapped with a hefty penalty for illegal modifications to their car at last weekend’s race at Talladega Motor Speedway.
Harvick, who is no longer a playoff contender to win the championship, placed 29th in the race. After, his car was selected by NASCAR to be sent to its R&D center for inspection. Once the inspection was done, NASCAR announced he and Stewart-Haas Racing were hit with penalties.
According to Yahoo Sports, Harvick and the team were docked 100 points each, which will likely mean he places 16th out of 16 in the overall Playoff standings after a lackluster performance in the Cup Series in 2022. That’s not all.
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Crew chief Rodney Childers was also fined $100,000 over the infraction and suspended for the next four of the remaining five races in the 2022 season. Per usual, NASCAR didn’t go into specifics about the nature of the illegal modifications beyond saying it violated parts of sections 14.1 and 14.5 of the rule book.
The outlet reports this section refers to single-source parts on the cars that relate to “aerodynamic properties” of the vehicle.
Harvick has been among the many outspoken critics of this season’s new Next Gen cars, but NASCAR President Steve Phelps said that had nothing to do with the penalties, according to the Associated Press.
“I would say that's ridiculous. No one has a vendetta against Kevin Harvick or Rodney, at all, or anyone at Stewart-Haas Racing," Phelps said. "Our guys are very good. They are going to look at (an infraction). Look at it again. Look at it a third time to make sure there's a penalty and the penalty is right. If the four team thinks that's not right, they will file an appeal."
However, tweets from Childers and Harvick just prior to the announcement of their penalties suggested they may feel otherwise.
Childers posted “Shocker…..” on Twitter after NASCAR announced the news. Minutes before that, Harvick cryptically tweeted, without context, “Seems strange…”
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