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CHARLOTTE, N.-C. – Kevin Harvick's bid for a second NASCAR title suffered a huge setback on Wednesday when he lost his place in the championship race because his winning car failed an inspection after Texas Motor Speedway.
The discovery of an illegally modified spoiler, made during a detailed after-race inspection after the return of the No. 4 Ford to the NASCAR Research and Development Center after Sunday's race, cancels the automatic position of Harvick in the last square. The violated rule states that spoilers must be used exactly as supplied by the manufacturer and not modified.
In addition to losing his spot in the upcoming weekend's Homestead-Miami Speedway final, Harvick is also scheduled to close the last two races of the season without Crew Leader Rodney Childers and Car Chef Robert Smith. Both were suspended for two races and Childers was also fined $ 75,000.
Harvick moored 40 pilot points and Stewart-Haas Racing also docked 40 owner points. Harvick tackles this weekend's race in Phoenix, fourth among the remaining eight playoff drivers, three points above the cut line. In the event of a tie for the last transfer post, Harvick would not be eligible to use the Texas win in the tie-breaker procedure.
Greg Zipadelli, vice president of competition at SHR, said his team would not appeal sanctions. Tony Gibson will be the interim crew chief of Harvick and Nick DeFazio will be the interim car manager.
"We work relentlessly on every inch of our race cars to create speed and, unfortunately, NASCAR decided to venture into an area that was not suited to its rules," said Zipadelli. "We will not appeal the sentence. Instead, we will focus our immediate attention on the event this weekend in Phoenix and control our destiny on the circuit. "
Harvick's victory in Texas was eighth in 2018 and qualified for Homestead with Joey Logano. Now three places in the final will win Sunday in Phoenix.
Harvick won the series championship of the 2014 series and went to Phoenix this season in a win-win situation to compete for the title. He has been successful and is a nine-time winner in Phoenix, including earlier this year.
Harvick has competed in the NASCAR final three of the past four years.
The penalty is disastrous for SHR, which entered the third round of the playoffs with its four drivers eligible for the championship. Logano took first place, which meant that the best thing for SHR was to qualify three cars for Homestead. Now, SHR could find itself completely excluded from the final if Harvick had not pbaded Phoenix. Aric Almirola, Kurt Busch and Clint Bowyer are all below the starting line and will likely have to win in Phoenix to progress.
The penalty against Harvick also closes a tough race for NASCAR, who wrongly penalized Jimmie Johnson a few moments before the start of the race. Johnson was sent to the back of the field because NASCAR thought his car had failed the inspection three times, but he had failed only twice.
NASCAR announced the error during the race and announced Monday that it has updated its procedures to prevent a similar error from occurring. Later in the same event, Bowyer was penalized for a member of the team who pbaded the pit lane too early. The crew member was sitting on the wall, feet touching asphalt on the pit lane, which was a violation, although it seemed extreme.
The Harvick team has been penalized with a penalty that could change the composition of the last four drivers entered for the title. Harvick, alongside Kyle Busch and Martin Truex Jr., is part of NASCAR's famous Big Three, which dominated the season with a series of summer races. All three were expected for the championship, and none are qualified for Homestead, but there is only one race left.
"We do not want to impose penalties, but we will do so if necessary to ensure that every race and every championship is played on an equal footing," said Scott Miller, senior vice president of the NASCAR event. "We will now return to our goal, Phoenix, and the battle for a championship."
Also Wednesday, NASCAR penalized the teams of Ryan Blaney and Erik Jones, who have already been eliminated from the playoffs.
Blaney team leader Jeremy Bullins was fined $ 50,000 and auto chief Kirk Almquist was suspended for the next two races. Jones' team leader Chris Gayle was fined $ 50,000 and car boss Jason Overstreet was on two suspensions.
It was not until Wednesday that the penalties were announced because the cars were in transit Monday from Texas to North Carolina. The inspection took place on Tuesday and the teams do the dismantling themselves. Once the Harvick breach was discovered Tuesday night, NASCAR had to check whether the violation was correct and did not disclose its findings until the next day, two days before Harvick and his team leader and his interim car chief will practice in Phoenix.
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