Team owner Rusty Wallace won't appeal crew chief suspension

By Lee Montgomery - Associate Editor

Friday, June 12, 2009

NASCAR Nationwide Series team owner Rusty Wallace will not appeal the suspension of crew chief Bryan Berry.

Jim Fluharty
NASCAR Scene

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SPARTA, Ky. – NASCAR Nationwide Series team owner Rusty Wallace said Friday at Kentucky Speedway that he will not appeal the suspension of crew chief Bryan Berry despite disagreeing with the penalty handed down Thursday.

Berry was suspended indefinitely for an incident following last weekend’s race at Nashville Superspeedway, where Wallace said Berry was accused of using a racial slur to Marc Davis, an African-American driver who had collided on pit road with Berry’s driver, Brendan Gaughan, during the race.

Wallace said Berry denied making the slur, but the team still will not appeal.

“No, I do not agree with the suspension at all,” Wallace said as his teams prepared for the Meijer 300 on Saturday night. “But I support NASCAR’s thought behind it. We can’t tolerate any racial things whatsoever in the garage area.

“All I can say is my guy has promised that he never said that. He did admit that he was screaming his butt off, he was mad, he was cursing. And he said he did not say that.”

Wallace said there was “nothing to appeal.”

“I understand how everybody’s so nervous about this thing with what they’ve been through,” Wallace said. “I’m not going to raise hell about it. I didn’t see it. … If we’ve got to do this to set an example and make sure we’re right, we’ll do it. There’s no more to it.”

Wallace said Harry Davis, Marc’s father, apologized for the situation. Harry Davis, according to Wallace, said Berry is a “great guy” and hoped Berry could return from suspension as soon as possible.

Wallace also said the mother of one his former drivers, Chase Austin, also called in support of Berry. Marianne Austin, Wallace said, would write a letter to NASCAR to back Berry if she needed to.

“It sounds like everybody’s a little trigger happy,” Wallace said. “I think everybody at NASCAR got a little trigger happy because this is an issue that nobody wants to tolerate. We’ll go through the motions; we’ll do whatever it takes to get Bryan back in.”

Wallace said he hopes the suspension lasts two weeks at the most and that NASCAR President Mike Helton told him his goal is to get Berry back as soon as possible.

“I fully, 100 percent support Bryan,” Wallace said. “I know one thing, the team is crystal clear that nowadays, you can’t do anything like that. I got on the team airplane this morning at 8 o’clock because it was the first time I was able to get everybody together, and I said, ‘Look, you see what happened. I love you guys and I support you and I always take a bullet for you. But if this happens, I can’t take a bullet for you. This can’t ever happen.’

“They understood that. It’s loud and clear.”