Fan reaction has been strongly against NASCAR’s scoring calls at Rockingham, and a number of drivers and crews here continue to question NASCAR’s decisions in the final minutes of #17-Matt Kenseth’s victory over #9-Kasey Kahne and #42-Jamie McMurray But NASCAR’s John Darby said yesterday the right calls were made at Rockingham and the only change might have been to penalize McMurray for not slowing immediately after the yellow came out. “Ten days later we’re convinced we did the right thing,” Darby said. “We’ve had the opportunity to go back and extract data from not only the new scoring system but also TV telemetry and different areas. What we understand now is the situation was created more by Jamie not slowing down properly when the caution was displayed than any other ingredient. So Matt Kenseth and Kasey Kahne were put almost a lap down when they should not have been. We righted that. The question now is if the situation were to happen again, what would we change? If the situation were to happen here Sunday we would still ‘right’ Matt and Kasey and very possibly penalize Jamie for not slowing down.” Now comes the hard part for Darby and the rest of the NASCAR hierarchy – persuading Cup teams and fans, particularly car owners Chip Ganassi and Felix Sabates. “We haven’t had the opportunity to sit down with Felix and Chip, but we plan to this weekend,” Darby said. There are still a number of questions, which were being raised in several Cup rigs yesterday by confused and irate crewmen. Among the questions: NASCAR’s new scoring system, based on eight wires cut into the asphalt around the track to pinpoint the location of cars through transponders. That system is apparently only available to AOL subscribers willing to pay an extra fee; and it is apparently not available to teams or NASCAR officials at the track. Darby said it still has “some bugs to work out.” Second, Kenseth ran the stop sign at the end of pit road but wasn’t penalized. Darby said Kenseth “was instructed to do so by us.” Some who were monitoring NASCAR radio at the time disputed that, saying they heard no such command. The general issue of the use of a stop sign during a stop that began as a green-flag stop was in some dispute yesterday. Third, there is still the issue of just when does the yellow actually come out. Fourth, the basic issue that many in the garage have found it difficult to fathom how a driver can pit under green, be passed as the yellow comes out, and yet wind up with an advantage. At least one crew said it was the second time during the Rockingham race that NASCAR had made such a scoring error.(See full story at the Winston Salem Journal)(3-6-2004)
