Helton says changes should reduce caution lengths

LONG POND, Pa. -- NASCAR president Mike Helton said Friday that the 24-lap caution period in last Sunday's MBNA 400 at Dover was "unacceptable" and added that the sanctioning body is taking steps to make sure it doesn't happen again.

"I can explain why it happened," said Helton. "I could sit here and tell you the process of what all happened in that 24-lap window, but it has no merit.

	NASCAR president Mike Helton

"We'll do whatever we can to hopefully avoid that happening again."

To that end, Helton announced a few changes NASCAR will implement, starting with this weekend's Pocono 500.

Most notably, the sanctioning body will depend completely on an electronic "scoring loop" system to determine where the cars should be lined up following a caution flag.

The system is identical to the transponder scoring used at the start/finish line, whereby each car signals a "loop" -- or antenna -- inserted in the racetrack.

Helton said the number of loops and the distance between them will differ depending on the racetrack.

Simply put, when a caution comes out, the field is lined up based on their position when they passed the most recent loop.

Helton said the system has been used as part of NASCAR's scoring procedure since the Daytona 500 in February. He said officials have waited to give it more weight until they understood completely how it works and gained confidence that it would work correctly.

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Starting this weekend, it will be the only factor in determining where cars line up.

"We've gained more and more confidence in the system," said Helton. "We feel like we can eliminate the human element that led a lot, in part, to the extended caution last weekend.

"It now will depend on the electronics to say, 'this is where he was.'"

Helton explained that if a change in position happens between the loops, it will not be scored.

"It's based on the last time you passed the loop. So it doesn't matter what happened between the loops.

Helton added that NASCAR would use television replays to determine position if a caution flag flies inside the time during which the sanctioning body wouldn't throw a red flag.

Other changes

Also, Helton announced that beginning this weekend, NASCAR will open pit road when the leader passes the pit road entrance the second time, not when the pace car passes the entrance.

In addition, NASCAR will bring the "free pass" car past the pace car as the lead cars are pitting, not after everyone has pitted, as in past races. However, the driver getting his lap back will still have to pit with the lap-down cars.

Helton said all the changes are in the interest of cutting down the number of caution laps in each race -- an issue that has been brought to the forefront so far this season. It came to a head last weekend at Dover, when 90 of the 400 laps were under yellow during 11 caution periods.

"We need to rethink our procedures and policies that are forwarded to the competitors, but are simple enough for the people to follow."