Rusty Wins Appeal After Junior Drops His

The National Stock Car Racing Commission earlier this overturned an earlier decision to penalize the no. 64 team of Rusty Wallace Inc. for an unsecured oil lid in the Nationwide Series race at Daytona in February.  The Commission reinstated crew chief Steve Darne, and also reinstated David Stremme’s 25 driver points and the team’s $15k fine.  Despite being reinstated, however, Darne has since left Rusty Wallace Inc. on his own terms for other reasons not yet made public.  Rusty Wallace himself is unsure how the Commission’s decision to overturn this team’s penalty will affect the other four Nationwide teams that were penalized at Daytona for similar incidents, and I’m sure that most of the racing world is now waiting to see if this has any bearing on NASCAR’s decision on whether or not they should punish Carl Edwards for his bizarre incident following post-race inspection at Las Vegas.

Meanwhile, just before NASCAR got things started this past weekend in Las Vegas, JR Motorsports decided to drop their appeal for the penalties their team incurred during the same week that Wallace’s team was penalized. Junior’s penalty was for an illegal deck lift his team installed after qualifying, and it resulted in the loss of 50 driver points, a $25k fine, and crew chief Chad Walter receiving a six-race suspension. Walter has already begun serving his suspension with Hendrick Motorsports employee and former crew chief Lance McGrew filling in for the no. 5 team in the interim.