Appeals panel upholds most severe NASCAR penalties issued to Kaulig Racing

In a statement with its decision, the three-member panel said the team did violate NASCAR rules and upheld much of the harsh penalties issued to the team, including the $100,000 fine and four-race suspension for crew chief Trent Owens and the loss of 10 playoff points.

The panel did, however, reduce the 100 owner and 100 driver points penalties to 75 points each.

The appeals panel members for this hearing were Hunter Nickell, Shawna Robinson and Steve York. Kaulig Racing can still make one final appeal to the Final Appeals Officer, Bill Mullis.

On 15 March, NASCAR issued penalties to five Cup teams – all four Hendrick Motorsports teams and the #31 team from Kaulig – for the unapproved modification of hood louvers (vents) which are single-source parts.

Bonnet louvers serve as a release point for ducts that transfer air out of the radiator of each car.

A different three-member appeals panel issued a decision last week that retained the fines and crew chief suspensions but eliminated the owner, driver and playoff point penalties for all four HMS teams.

With the introduction of the Next Gen car in the 2022 season, NASCAR updated its penalty system to include much harsher consequences for violations, including the revoking of playoff eligibility, in particular with respect to modifying parts from single-source suppliers.

Much of the construction of the new model car revolves around single-source supplied parts, greatly reducing or eliminating the need of individual teams to spend money developing and producing their own.

Several teams were penalised last season for modification of single-source supplier parts and Joe Gibbs Racing had a pair of cars disqualified from Pocono last year for having additional tape on the nose of the cars of race winner Denny Hamlin and Kyle Busch.