NASCAR chief issues statement ahead of COTA race after MAJOR driver punishment

Joe Gibbs Racing president Dave Alpern has spoken out on the huge punishments handed out to Chase Briscoe and his #19 team after NASCAR found them to be in breach of the rules at Daytona last month.

Briscoe was the pole winner at the Daytona 500, but when his car was inspected by NASCAR at their R&D center after the race weekend, modifications were deemed to have been made to the spoiler, resulting in a level two infringement.

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As a result of this, NASCAR announced a number of punishments for both the driver and his team. First and foremost, Briscoe himself was docked 100 driver points and 10 playoff points, whilst Joe Gibbs Racing were also deducted 100 owner points and 10 playoff points.

On top of this, the team were slapped with a hefty $100,000 fine, as well as a four-race suspension for the crew chief of the #19 car, James Small.

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Joe Gibbs Racing chief addresses Briscoe punishment

The team are planning to appeal the decision, with their arguments set to be heard on March 5.

However, ahead of this weekend's race at Circuit of the Americas (COTA), team president Alpern has been discussing the matter on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.

“My best explanation is like when you buy furniture from IKEA, and you get a couple of pieces you gotta line up the holes and you gotta put the screws in,” Alpern explained.

“Well, when they attached the spoiler to the base, it has 21 pre-drilled holes and they don’t all line up perfectly, so we screwed the spoiler on, it passed inspection, it raced legally, it passed inspection afterward. When they took it off, some of the screw holes were offset, again because when you go to install it, they don’t line up perfectly.”

Alpern continued: "To me, that’s not modifying a part, like it didn’t make us go faster, we screwed something on and it met the perfect template, just some of the screw holes were offset because they didn’t line up perfectly and that’s my simple explanation of what happened.

“They will articulate that to some degree by showing the variations in the holes, talking to other teams, and saying if you take theirs off, you’re probably going to see the same kind of thing, so that’s the best way I can explain it.”

Turning his attention to the suspension of the #19 crew chief, Alpern added that it 'stinks'.

"That stinks,” Alpern said on potentially losing Smalls for four races. “That’s not what you want, obviously.

"Teams all have the war rooms, and they can communicate and things, but there’s a reason you pair these people together, and the best scenario is him sitting on the box at the racetrack.

“I’m not sure Chase anticipated being negative in points at the beginning of the season, but we’ll bounce out of it, and I expect the #19 car will have a great season, and we’ll get him in victory lane, and come playoff time, we can make up this deficit.

"But it’s a huge hole, it’s a huge discouragement, and hopefully we can get a positive outcome with that.”

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