NASCAR officials fined the No. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing team Tuesday for a lug-nut infraction after last Saturday’s Xfinity Series race at Talladega Superspeedway.
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The violation of Section 10.9.10.4 in the NASCAR Rule Book was discovered in a post-race check, where the No. 19 Toyota — driven by Brandon Jones to a second-place finish in the Sparks 300 — was found with one unsecured lug nut. That infraction resulted in a $5,000 fine for Jeff Meendering, the team’s crew chief.
No other penalties were announced from the tripleheader weekend at the 2.66-mile Talladega track, which also hosted the Cup Series and the Camping World Truck Series.
No further penalties were assessed to the No. 11 Kaulig Racing team for a rules violation found in pre-race inspection before the Xfinity Series event. Driver Justin Haley was forced to start at the rear of the field and serve a pit-road pass-through penalty after the green flag because of improperly applied decals on the No. 11 Chevrolet.
“Just in talking with (series director) Wayne Auton, it looks like multiple layers of the wrap that the teams put on the cars, anything you can do at the superspeedways may seem as minute to our fans, but there’s some performance there,” said Elton Sawyer, NASCAR’s vice president of officiating and technical inspection, in a Tuesday appearance on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio. “The inspectors caught that and they corrected it and put them to the rear of the field. No additional penalties will come out of that one.”