NASCAR president Mike Helton held a press conference on Friday at Homestead-Miami Speedway, a few questions were about the MWR scandal at Richmond: Q . Its been 10 weeks since the MWR scandal and the fallout. What, if any, impact do you think that had on the season or the Chase? Does that leave a stain on the season, or have things kind of moved on to the point that you think the sport has recovered from it? MIKE HELTON : Well, I think it was a defining moment, and we spoke a lot about it back in Chicago when we were making steps toward what we would do as a league, and I think it was important for us to do that quickly so that we could move on. One of the tough things about our sport is the length of the season, but its also an asset at times, and so you move on fairly quickly. And I think in the case of Richmond this year in September, I suspect that that moment will be reflected on for many years to come, but the decisions that we made, the reaction in the industry that self-polices itself is indicative of our environment, and weve kind of moved on from that. Certainly because of the uniqueness of having a 13th competitor in the Chase, it made a difference on the 2013 Chase format, so to speak, but I think we made the decisions we made after Richmond before we even started the races in Chicago, which was the right thing for us to do. We did it with a lot of thought and engagement by a lot of people in the business to make sure we took the next step correctly to decide what we needed to do and then go on, but I think weve moved on. Q. I wanted to follow up on the question about Richmond and the fallout from that. I believe you said that the decisions that NASCAR made were the right decisions, so looking back, youre confident you would not change anything in the way NASCAR handled that situation? MIKE HELTON : Thats correct. Were confident in what we did.(NASCAR/FastScripts by ASAP Sports)
