NASCAR Cup Series

Exclusive: NASCAR VP explains significant change in inspection process

Published Feb. 25, 2017 9:00 a.m. ET

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Tom Jensen

NASCAR has made a significant change in the inspection process for 2017.

In years past, if a car failed one the inspection stations, the team would pull it out of line, make repairs and send it back on through.

But crew chiefs are a wily lot.

Sometimes, a team would pull a car out of line and correct the problem, but at the same time make other changes to areas of the car that had already passed inspection and wouldn’t get checked again.

This year, though, if a car flunks any part of inspection, it has to go through the entire process again.

In an exclusive interview with FOXSports.com Thursday morning, NASCAR Senior Vice President of Competition Scott Miller explained why the sanctioning body made the change.

“That was a reaction to several different things with several different people’s input,” said Miller. “The teams were struggling with some of what was going on. NASCAR was struggling with some of what was going on in the old process, as well as the O.E.M.s (automakers).”

Inspections are always an issue and already at Daytona Speedweeks, some teams have had difficulty passing tech. Sunday’s Daytona 500 (2 p.m. ET, FOX) should be a good litmus test of the new procedures.

“We as a sanctioning body have more of a way to kind of maintain custody of those cars as they go through inspection and make sure that the teams aren’t passing one station and then working on the car to circumvent that station as they pass through the rest,” said Miller.

Now, Miller said, “They need to pass them all and be clean in them all before they are actually allowed out for competition.”

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