Following a controversial call that resulted in a late-race black flag for Brian Vickers in Saturday’s O’Reilly 300 Busch Series race, NASCAR president Mike Helton reviewed the policy for passing on the restarts at the drivers’ meeting before Sunday’s Cup race. NASCAR said that even though Vickers hadn’t completely passed Chad Blount’s car to the left before the start-finish line on a Lap 179 restart in Saturday’s race, he was in the act of passing and therefore in violation of the rule. “The act of passing is in NASCAR’s judgment when it happened,” Helton said. “Yesterday we chose that it was the act of passing taking place, therefore we had the black flag. …All passing is to the right. And the act of passing is when NASCAR deems that momentum is taking place before the start-finish line.” NASCAR officials also answered several questions about the final restart on Lap 191 in Saturday’s race, which was a double-file restart. Restarts are single file with less than 10 laps to go in a race, but with 10 complete laps left they’re double-file. “There’s a line, and it’s 10 laps to go,” Helton said. “You got the one-to-go (signal) with 11 to go and you completed that lap and got the green. …It’s 10 laps to go.”( ThatsRacin.com ) AND see my Story/Columns/Article Links page for many more stories and commentary on this.(3-31-2003)
