NASCAR Sharply Penalizes Michael McDowell, Front Row Motorsports

Front Row Motorsports’ No. 34 team was dealt a hefty penalty, a L-2 level, after discovering illegal modifications to the No. 34 following last weekend’s race at Pocono Raceway.

NASCAR docked them 100 driver points, 100 owner points and if Michael McDowell and the No. 34 team win any of the last five regular season races or if they qualify for the playoffs, they will be docked 10 playoff points. Crew chief Blake Harris was individually fined $100,000 and has been suspended for the next four races. 

This penalty drops McDowell to 27th in the standings. 

The 37-year-old’s car and Ricky Stenhouse’s were randomly selected by the sanctioning body following the race to be further inspected at the NASCAR R&D Center. 

“To make sure that all of those things stay above board, there’s going to have to be a culture shift from the way that the teams and NASCAR, for that matter, have done business,” NASCAR senior vice president of competition Scott Miller said back in January when the new penalty structure was announced. “So this deterrence model has more meat in it, more meaningful penalties, but I think we all thought that it was time for this with the introduction of the new car.”

These penalties come after NASCAR disqualified both Pocono winner Denny Hamlin and second-place Kyle Busch when the two vehicles failed post-race inspections. There was illegal tape on the front fascia of the cars, and Joe Gibbs Racing decided not to appeal the ruling. 

Chase Elliott was subsequently awarded the win. 

“In our review of the post-race infractions on the 11 and 18 cars at Pocono, it was discovered that a single piece of clear tape was positioned over each of the lower corners of the front fascia ahead of the left-front and right-front wheel openings on both those cars,” JGR competition director Wally Brown said in a statement on Monday. “The added pieces were 2 inches wide and 5 ½ inches long with a thickness of 0.012 inches and installed under the wrap. This change in our build process was not properly vetted within our organization and we recognize it is against NASCAR’s rules. We apologize to everyone for this mistake, and we have made changes to our processes to ensure that it does not happen again.”