Erik Jones and the No. 51 Kyle Busch Motorsports team were victorious last Friday night in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series at Iowa Speedway, but they’ve been penalized today by NASCAR after Jones’ truck was found to be too low in post-race inspection.
Jones has lost 10 driver’s points and owner Kyle Busch has lost 10 owner’s points. Additionally, Jones’ crew chief, Eric Phillips, has been fined $6,000 and placed on probation until Dec. 31.
Per NASCAR, the penalty is a P2 level infraction that violates Sections 12-1 (actions detrimental to stock car racing) and 20B-12.8.1 (truck failed to meet post-race height requirements) of the 2014 rule book.
The Iowa infraction marked the second consecutive week that the No. 51 was found to be too low in the front after a win, as Kyle Busch took the No. 51 to victory at Kentucky Speedway on June 26.
A minimum ride height rule was abolished in Sprint Cup as part of its 2014 rules package, but such rules remain in both the Trucks and the Nationwide Series.
Over the weekend at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, Busch touched on why his KBM Truck team has been having issues in that regard.
“There’s a tolerance or a window of I think a quarter inch that you’re allowed in green,” Busch said according to NASCAR.com. “Well, we start at the low side of that because that’s the way our setup is. So it doesn’t really give us that much space to go through the yellow, which I think is three-eighths of an inch or so. [With] the Nationwide cars, I think that tolerance is a half-inch. They widened it and guys are not having issues now because the tolerance is bigger.
“Our Trucks still seem to be having that issue just because the tolerance window wasn’t opened up as what Nationwide is, so we’re trying to get it the best we can. It’s our front end setup stuff. People know what we’re running. They know what we’re doing. It’s just a matter of trying to get it fine-tuned a little bit more, where we can start higher and maybe maintain a little bit better height if they don’t change the rule.”
