On Wednesday, March 5, NASCAR penalized Team Penske’s Austin Cindric after an incident between him and Ty Dillon during the Cup Series race at Circuit of the Americas. Although Cindric managed to avoid a suspension, he was fined $50,000 and docked 50 points by NASCAR for spinning Dillon with right-rear contact after their cars collided.
As a result of the points deduction, Cindric’s position fell from 11th to 35th in the standings. However, NASCAR stopped short of giving him a one-race suspension, something it has done in the past with drivers who intentionally wrecked other vehicles.
Did NASCAR Go Easy on Austin Cindric?
Fans are calling the driver of the No. 2 Team Penske Ford lucky after other drivers received suspensions for similar incidents.
As mentioned, early in the race at COTA, Cindric made contact with the right rear of Dillon’s No. 10 Chevrolet, sending the latter spinning down the front stretch. According to NASCAR, Cindric’s move falls under the category of intentionally wrecking another vehicle under Sections 4.4 B&D: NASCAR Member Code of Conduct Penalty Options and Guidelines.
In the past, the governing body has handed out one-race suspensions for similar right-rear hook maneuvers. Most recently, in 2023, Chase Elliott was suspended after crashing into Denny Hamlin at Charlotte Motor Speedway. In 2022, Bubba Wallace received a suspension for wrecking Kyle Larson at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
Clearing the air on the matter, Mike Forde, NASCAR managing director of racing communications, said during an episode of “Hauler Talk” that the reason Cindric wasn’t suspended was because this incident took place on a road course and did not lead to a caution flag. The previous incidents occurred on ovals.
Forde said, “The reason we landed on the points and fine is we take every situation and every violation as its own unique incident, and I know fans probably don’t love hearing that, but it’s said because it’s true. Sure, we do look at past instances to help educate ourselves on how we should handle each subsequent one, but each incident is very different.”
He added, “In this case, we did feel that it was significantly different than the previous two. And the reasons are it is at a road course with lower speeds to begin with, and the results didn’t even draw a caution flag. So those were really the reasons why we chose to err on the side of letting (Cindric) race this weekend in Phoenix with a fine and a significant driver points penalty.
“… When I hit social media after this penalty is announced, my guess is that there are going to be several people who feel this is the wrong call. And it may not be the popular call, but when we look at penalties, we do not really care how popular we are. We try to do the right thing here.”
