The Carl Edwards/Tony Stewart Restart Controversy

The bottom line is that the 99 team should have known it's position. Sounds to me like the spotter screwed up and used the scoring pylon (which everyone knows is not an official scoring device) to figure out Carl's position then made up a story about talking to an official to cover his ass.

Stuff like this happens sometimes. If a driver I really liked was involved I'd probably be upset.
 
The thing about it is , it was an instant , naked eye , judgement call . All of the armchair quarterbacks , sitting there with their slow motion replay and their analysis of what was in each driver's mind can like it or lump it . NASCAR RULES...GO BRIAN.
 
Bottom line, Carl restarted 2 car lengths early, and in his post race comments he admitted that he was doing the same thing all night. I had noticed it earlier and thought it was another case of the Golden Child getting a free pass from NASCAR. I was real happy they finally called it.

Carl had a David Ragan moment, and he paid for it. Tony is the only guy who got screwed by a friggin' water bottle.
 
I think nascar made the right call.

I am not buying the confusion, Carl should have known that Tony was in front of him. After pitting as the field approaches the pace car Stewart arrived first, that means you are least one position behind Stewart, regardless of JJs status or tire scrubbing.
That's a basic that Edwards surely mastered long ago. It is the big time if needed have a team members wife or someone that is observant enough to inform.

So he jumped a car in front of him.


I think the punishment was heavyhanded. I would have ordered him to get back behind Stewart, maybe back to p3, and issued only a drive through warning.
 
Greg said:
I think the punishment was heavyhanded. I would have ordered him to get back behind Stewart, maybe back to p3, and issued only a drive through warning.
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Unfortunately, that's NASCAR's way with all their penalties. You get a drive through for speeding in a single section by .001 or .1. Why not send a guy back a few spots or a bunch of spots depending on how far over they were? They do the same thing with car infractions. Bowyer got much the same fine for the rear being .016 too high as RedBull did when they acid dipped their body panels to save weight and MWR got when they shaved their wind shield to deflect air off the spoiler.

But in Carls situation, it doesn't matter at all that he thought he was the leader. He knows EXACTLY where the restart line is, and he jumped it by 2 car lengths. Those rules were designed to lessen the mayhem on restarts, so violating them so flagrently should be dealt with harshly.
 
I think they should've waved off that restart when they realized there was some confusion due to the scoring system.
 
FenderBumper said:
Unfortunately, that's NASCAR's way with all their penalties. You get a drive through for speeding in a single section by .001 or .1. Why not send a guy back a few spots or a bunch of spots depending on how far over they were? They do the same thing with car infractions. Bowyer got much the same fine for the rear being .016 too high as RedBull did when they acid dipped their body panels to save weight and MWR got when they shaved their wind shield to deflect air off the spoiler.

But in Carls situation, it doesn't matter at all that he thought he was the leader. He knows EXACTLY where the restart line is, and he jumped it by 2 car lengths. Those rules were designed to lessen the mayhem on restarts, so violating them so flagrently should be dealt with harshly.
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I think speeding on pit road is more serious than jumping a restart.
 
#17D500winner said:
I think speeding on pit road is more serious than jumping a restart.
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IMO, not always. When I consider all the mayhem that ensued back when restarts were free for all and compare that to going 50.001 in a section on pit road, I feel Carl jumping the restart line again and again is far more disturbing. I think it's pathetic that Carl tried to blame NASCAR AND Tony, rather than just accept that he got caught breaking the rules. It becomes outright cheating, and Carl has won races doing this. He actually complained that Tony didn't go. WTF? He's pissed that Tony obeyed the rules?

On a side note, I was very happy that Hammond and Michael straightened out that idiot DW, who was making every excuse in the book for his favorite hugging sack.
 
FenderBumper said:
IMO, not always. When I consider all the mayhem that ensued back when restarts were free for all and compare that to going 50.001 in a section on pit road, I feel Carl jumping the restart line again and again is far more disturbing. I think it's pathetic that Carl tried to blame NASCAR AND Tony, rather than just accept that he got caught breaking the rules. It becomes outright cheating, and Carl has won races doing this. He actually complained that Tony didn't go. WTF? He's pissed that Tony obeyed the rules?
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I have a feeling that Bill Elliot would disagree with you - as do I.
 
Elliot had a crew member killed in Atlanta back in 1990 from a pit road incident.

Rudd came hot onto the pit road and spun as there was no speed limit at that time. There's video of it but I'm not posting it here but you can do a search and have a look.
 
#17D500winner said:
Elliot had a crew member killed in Atlanta back in 1990 from a pit road incident.
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Very sad, but you're missing my point. Was he killed by a guy going .001 over the limit? All speeding isn't the same. All intentional wrecks aren't the same. All car infractions aren't the same. Why treat them all the same?

Jumping the restart by 2 car lengths when nascar went to the trouble of painting all those lines and boxes on the track is just plain cheating, and should be dealt with as such. If Carls bumper was a foot outside, I would feel differently. Carl knew damn well he was leaving early and decided to do it anyway because he got away with it so many time before. That's plain cheating.
 
FenderBumper said:
Very sad, but you're missing my point. Was he killed by a guy going .001 over the limit? All speeding isn't the same. All intentional wrecks aren't the same. All car infractions aren't the same. Why treat them all the same?

Jumping the restart by 2 car lengths when nascar went to the trouble of painting all those lines and boxes on the track is just plain cheating, and should be dealt with as such. If Carls bumper was a foot outside, I would feel differently. Carl knew damn well he was leaving early and decided to do it anyway because he got away with it so many time before. That's plain cheating.
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I get your point but believe that speeding on pit road to be more serious of an infraction. Just a difference in opinion :)
 
My question and it might sound dumb, but why was there not a wave around. Cars like Logano and Ambrose were up with the leaders. Isn't there a wave around on every restart?
 
JimmieGordon2448 said:
My question and it might sound dumb, but why was there not a wave around. Cars like Logano and Ambrose were up with the leaders. Isn't there a wave around on every restart?
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That one was mass confusion for sure. Maybe they were on the lead lap but didn't pit until after the restart. Who knows.
 
FenderBumper said:
That one was mass confusion for sure. Maybe they one the lead lap but didn't pit until after the restart. Who knows.
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they weren't shown on the lead lad and the reason Tony pulled away from Kyle, cause they slowed up the guys behind Tony.
 
JimmieGordon2448 said:
My question and it might sound dumb, but why was there not a wave around. Cars like Logano and Ambrose were up with the leaders. Isn't there a wave around on every restart?
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I think those cars were trapped there by #48 - I think :confused:
 
JimmieGordon2448 said:
they weren't shown on the lead lad and the reason Tony pulled away from Kyle, cause they slowed up the guys behind Tony.
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You're right. Biffle was a lap down too, but they restarted in front of a bunch of lead lap cars. Does nascar do the wave around inside 20 laps? This could be a good twitter question for Dustin long.
 
be9ak7ts16 said:
Edwards clearly jumped the restart, whats with the discussion. He got a black flag he earned.
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The discussion is because Edwards claims his spotter was told that he was the leader and would've taken the inside on Stewart so he was trying to negate that advantage but either way, he jumped the restart.
 
I don't know who really screwed up. But it should have been obvious that Edwards was not the leader. He pitted after Stewart and therefore should have been behind him in the running order.
 
Just to make Tony fans even more engry...

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Tony Stewart said in his interview that a water bottle caused the last caution. That's right. A water bottle. Dale Earnhardt, Jr., in an interview with Wendy Venturini also made a claim that he would be upset if a water bottle ruined "my chance at a win."

Well guess who reported the "deBriS" (notice BS is capitalized) on the back straightaway? What would make this story more interesting? According to multiple NASCAR writers on twitter, it was the 99 that called in about the "deBriS" on the back straightaway!

A make up caution? Draw your own conclusions.

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/...enalties-but-not-paying-attention-to-the-race

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So, maybe it was Carl trying to get back some of the positions he cost himself. Mr Honesty pulled a fast one on NASCAR and affected the outcome of the race.
 
FenderBumper said:
Just to make Tony fans even more engry...

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Tony Stewart said in his interview that a water bottle caused the last caution. That's right. A water bottle. Dale Earnhardt, Jr., in an interview with Wendy Venturini also made a claim that he would be upset if a water bottle ruined "my chance at a win."

Well guess who reported the "deBriS" (notice BS is capitalized) on the back straightaway? What would make this story more interesting? According to multiple NASCAR writers on twitter, it was the 99 that called in about the "deBriS" on the back straightaway!

A make up caution? Draw your own conclusions.

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/...enalties-but-not-paying-attention-to-the-race

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So, maybe it was Carl trying to get back some of the positions he cost himself. Mr Honesty pulled a fast one on NASCAR and affected the outcome of the race.
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BRING ME THE DUCK and somebody HOLD MY WATCH.:mad:
 
He went before the restart line, I think if Tony didn't spin the tires it wouldn't have been so magnified. NASCAR had to make this call. You hate to see a guy lose it like that, but that's the rule.
 
Don't let's forget here that Carl admitted that he had jumped the restart in a similar manner before in the race and he didn't do anything different this time . That sounds to me like maybe he might have pissed Nascar off a little bit and they reacted to all the restarts , not just the one.
 
ted@economy said:
Don't let's forget here that Carl admitted that he had jumped the restart in a similar manner before in the race and he didn't do anything different this time . That sounds to me like maybe he might have pissed Nascar off a little bit and they reacted to all the restarts , not just the one.
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He beat Kyle in a NW race by going 30 feet early.
 
as soon as it happened i said WTF,then after the race flip boy watched replay n said he didnt jump,lol,FORD N CATBOY SUCK.
 
NASCAR VP of Comp. Robin Pemberton explained Carl Edwards situation on Sirius NASCAR Radio this morning. Here's some of what he said ...


Was there any confusion on NASCAR's part who was leading?

Pemberton: "No, we knew who was leading. I believe that Bob Osborne knew who was leading until the doubt was cast by maybe the spotter stand or the scoring pylon or something like that. With one (lap) to go (before the restart), everybody knew who was leading and who was second and then it got confused after that.''

How does the scoring pylon work with timing and scoring?

Pemberton: "It's the (scoring) loops that are embedded in the race track and each car has two transponders, a main and a backup. When they cross that line, it posts the one to 43 on the scoring pylon. In this particular case, what I think confused the spotter on the 99 (Edwards' team) was the fact that when we gave one (lap) to go and the 99 and 14 all the cars were scrubbing tires and trying to get the brakes warm and up to temperature ... the 99 beat the 14 to the finish line on the one to go. It changed the scoring pylon, so (Edwards) was never the leader. It just changed the scoring pylon because he crossed it first coming to one to go. That was a mistake on their part right off the bat. ... Nobody ever thought anything about it and then I guess in the middle of (turn) three, the spotter was talking about "We're the leader.' Now, where he got that information from, there's a lot of finger pointing that goes on. The fact of the matter is, it is David Hoots runs the races, John Darby is the series director and we work directly with the crew chiefs. We have an official that's in the crew chief box and all of that stuff is communicated through them. We don't work through the spotters. At that time, (crew chief) Bob Osborne never asked the question and we didn't think anything else about until that middle of (turns) three and four when, apparently, all heck was breaking loose because they thought they were the leader and they were not.''

So, there is not a NASCAR official on the spotter's stand communicating with spotters?

Pemberton: "There is, but he doesn't communicate timing and scoring. He's up there for other issues. He's not a timing and scoring official. He's not a race director of any kind. He's there for messages or to work with the spotters if there is some sort of other issue. To put him in charge of a lineup when he doesn't have any more equipment than a spotter does. It's strictly a crew chief's responsibility and our's in the tower to make sure that it's done correctly. Not the spotters. They're there for safety and they're there for other things. Now what maybe what could have happened or should have happen to help them, he should have said, "Bob, make sure the lineup's correct,'' and then Bob would have communicated to the official and we would have made sure that was correct.''
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From here.
 
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