On the restart to overtime, Dillon surrendered the lead to Joey Logano, but on the last lap, as they approached Turn 3, Dillon drove aggressively into the corner and into Logano’s rear, putting him into the wall.
A few moments later, Denny Hamlin crashed into the wall and spun across Dillon’s vehicle as he raced up on the inside of him.
Dillon was first across the finish line, and the wreck was marked with caution.
At the time, NASCAR authorities did not think twice about directing Dillon to Victory Lane.
NASCAR will review everything
Elton Sawyer, senior vice president of competition for NASCAR, stated that both Dillon’s and Logano’s acts will be investigated by the sanctioning body.
Logano had pulled into Dillon’s team’s pit stall following the race and spun his tires in front of onlookers.
“I felt that the final lap was something that, you know, our sport has historically involved contact,” Sawyer remarked.
“You know how frequently we hear, ‘Where’s the line? Did someone cross it?'”The final lap was really close to the line, in my opinion.
We’ll examine every resource—audio and video included—to determine whether anything stands out to the point where we believe sanctions are necessary.
In the past, intermediate and superspeedway events have typically resulted in penalties from NASCAR for both purposeful opponent wrecking and retaliatory moves.
“Taking away race (wins) hasn’t been in our DNA historically, but that doesn’t mean that if this continues, it won’t start to set a precedent or that we shouldn’t look at it,” he said.
Although we want our drivers to compete fiercely, there may come a time when it would have gone too far.
We’ll review all of the data and have a discussion the following week to determine if anything moves to a higher level that would warrant a penalty.
When asked if NASCAR had truly believed that Dillon’s conduct warranted a penalty at the time, Sawyer responded, “It happened fast, but I would say if you look at that, in my view, that’s getting right up really close to the line.”
Richard Childress, Dillon’s grandfather and the owner of his car, insisted that nothing happened at the finish of the race that hadn’t happened numerous times before.
Racing on a short track is racing on a short track. You will witness it. I’ve witnessed that numerous times,” Childress remarked.
“At the end of the day, any of these guys will go above and beyond to win the race there and then.”
