On Monday, Hendrick Motorsports made the announcement that they would not be pursuing an appeal of the penalty assessed on Alex Bowman and the number 48 car after The Roval race at Charlotte Motor Speedway.
The infraction was discovered during the post race inspection process when NASCAR determined that the car was underweight. A NASCAR stock car must weight 3,400 pounds before the driver climbs into the car.
NASCAR did not reveal the exact weight that was missing from the car.
As a result of the infraction, Alex Bowman was disqualified from his 18th place finishing spot and placed in last place. Bowman also lost his 10 stage points he received for winning stage two. The loss in points meant that Bowman would fall below the cut line to make it to the next round of the playoffs.
While every car is inspected prior to a race, NASCAR makes a random decision prior to the race as to which cars will be subjected to a post race inspection – the winner, second place car, and five random finishing spots.
HMS released a statement on the situation saying, “Hendrick Motorsports will not appeal the disqualification of the number 48 car following Sunday’s race at the Charlotte ROVAL. NASCAR allows a clear margin to account for the difference in pre- and post-race weight. After a thorough review by our team and the sanctioning body, we simply did not give ourselves enough margin to meet the post-race requirement. Although unintentional, the infraction was avoidable. We are extremely disappointed to lose a playoff spot under these circumstances and apologize to our fans and partners.”
Managing director of the NASCAR Cup Series Brad Moran also spoke on the penalty saying, “the number 48 team was provided with multiple attempts to clear post-race inspection: We … gave them the opportunity to fuel the car as well as purge the water system and add water. So we gave them every opportunity to make minimum weight. We ran them back through. Unfortunately, they were light again. They are allowed a 0.5% weight break, which is for usage of fluids and so on. That’s about 17 pounds. We backed the car back off the scales, ran it back on and then, unfortunately, it was the same weight. So the car had a weight issue. All the other cars cleared inspection. The 48 didn’t, and that ends up in a disqualification.”
Joey Logano replaced Alex Bowman in the round of eight along with William Byron, Chase Elliott, Kyle Larson, Denny Hamlin, Christopher Bell, Ryan Blaney, and Tyler Reddick.