NASCAR: Pit-road setup at Kentucky that nabbed 27 worked properly
SPARTA, Ky. – With 27 penalties for speeding on pit road – including 25 for speeding when exiting the pits – Nationwide Series drivers questioned whether the speeding zone at the end of pit road was working properly during the Meijer 300 on Saturday night at Kentucky Speedway.
The driver caught the most was Roush Fenway Racing’s Carl Edwards, who was called for speeding three times.
“We went slower and slower and still got caught over and over,” Edwards said. “Their last loop was not right. That’s it. My pit-road speed was 4100 [RPM] and I do this every week. Maybe twice I’ve got caught on pit road, and I knew it [in the past].
“They caught me the first time, so I put it down to 4000 and drove a car-length past the last cone and I still got caught. And then I went even slower and got caught again. It’s like being on the basketball court and taking a 3-point shot and them saying, ‘No, the line is somewhere else’ but you don’t know where it’s at, so I don’t know what speed I’m supposed to go.”
Nineteen drivers were caught speeding throughout the night. Pit-road speed was 45 mph, and drivers get a five mph tolerance. NASCAR Nationwide Series Director Joe Balash said many of the penalties were a fraction of a mile-per-hour quicker than the tolerance.
“We always check the system before the event starts,” Balash said. “We’re very confident in our pit-road scoring system. If we had issues there, it would be affecting the whole field. It only affected a small amount of the field, and we’re very confident our system was correct.
“We’re confident with the results that we had. We’re good with the results.”
Among the drivers caught were three of the top five drivers – winner Joey Logano, third-place Brad Keselowski and fifth-place Justin Allgaier.
Logano was one of the few to believe he actually was speeding, but he was nailed entering pit road.
“I [messed] up coming down pit road,” Logano said. “I didn’t think it was a big deal at that point in the race.”
No one thought it was a pace-car issue where the pace car could have been going too fast or had a faulty speedometer prior to the event. During one of the pace laps, the pace car goes pit-road speed so drivers can check their tachometers to make sure they have an accurate reading of pit-road speed.
“This is speculation – the cone was not in the proper place or the speed trap wasn’t calibrated right,” Keselowski said. “There was no way we could go all the way down pit road at the same speed and you were speeding in one [speed trap]. I know I held my position down pit road. Something was off on that last spot.”
While Logano and Keselowski were among those who rebounded from their penalties, Edwards did not. Granted, he struggled all night with his car but ended up three laps down in 20th at least partly because of the penalties.
“Like it or not, NASCAR messed up the final pit-road exit loop,” Edwards said. “They just messed it up. I’m real upset about it, but I know they’re doing the best they can.”
