Denny Hamlin’s hopes at a NASCAR Cup Series regular-season championship were wiped away and his road to his possible first Cup championship got a little bit more difficult after NASCAR issued a hefty penalty Thursday afternoon.
Hamlin’s race-winning Bristol engine from March was, according to Toyota, “mistakenly” rebuilt by the manufacturer (Toyota provides engines to its teams) before NASCAR could tear it down and inspect it.
NASCAR docked Hamlin and his team 75 points, 10 playoff points (points used in the playoffs that can help a driver advance in a round) and fined Hamlin crew chief Chris Gabehart $100,000.
With the penalty, Hamlin, who was third in the standings and just 28 points behind leader Tyler Reddick, dropped to sixth and an insurmountable 103 points behind Reddick with two races remaining in the regular season. He also saw his playoff points drop from 21 (third overall) to 11 (sixth overall) and likely will miss out on additional playoff points awarded based on the final regular-season standings.
Toyota Racing Development President David Wilson said the manufacturer takes full responsibility and that Joe Gibbs Racing was not involved in any of the engine disassembly.
Teams are required to use a previously used engine — sealed so that most of the components are not tampered with — in 18 of the 36 regular-season events. Full-time teams must give NASCAR a schedule of which events it plans to use a sealed engine prior to the start of the season.
TRD self-reported the violation, and NASCAR issued the penalty that goes with a race-winning engine having been altered before being inspected.
“TRD is solely responsible for the handling and disposition of all our engines pre- and post-race,” Wilson said in a statement. “Despite procedures being in place, Denny’s race-winning engine from Bristol was mistakenly returned to our Costa Mesa [Calif.] facility, disassembled and rebuilt instead of being torn down and inspected by NASCAR per the rulebook.
“Although we know with absolute certainty that the engine was legal and would have passed inspection, we left NASCAR in an impossible position because they were not given the opportunity to properly inspect our engine. We have reviewed our processes and have implemented several additional steps to ensure that this never happens again. TRD takes full responsibility for this grievous mistake, and we apologize to Denny, Chris, Coach Gibbs, the entire JGR organization, NASCAR and our fans.”
Bob Pockrass covers NASCAR for FOX Sports. He has spent decades covering motorsports, including over 30 Daytona 500s, with stints at ESPN, Sporting News, NASCAR Scene magazine and The (Daytona Beach) News-Journal. Follow him on Twitter @bobpockrass.
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