This is an update to:
Don’t Mess With NASCAR’S Rules
“The old saying that ‘Any press is good press’ is wrong in this respect, ” said two-time defending champion Jimmie Johnson, who has seen his team slip onto the wrong side of the NASCAR rule book numerous times.
“When you have that negative press on your team, it does put question marks in people’s minds, and that is something that takes a long time to overcome. I’ve lived it firsthand. It’s a tough thing to overcome.”
That’s the battle Red Bull faces with just one month left on a season in which it crawled from the bottom of the NASCAR pile and moved toward the front of the pack. Barely competitive during last year’s inaugural season, Vickers has challenged for wins and was in position to grab a career-high finish in the final point standings.
All that progress was sullied when NASCAR discovered illegal sheet metal on the No. 83 Toyota following Vickers’ 11th-place finish at Martinsville.
Red Bull general manager Jay Frye has already taken steps, telling The Associated Press on Friday he fired the person who manipulated the sheet metal.
“It was just a complete error in judgment,” Frye said. “What we did was wrong. It won’t happen again and it was for sure isolated. The person responsible has been removed from the company and others have been disciplined.”
Frye said he also put in place a stronger safeguarding system to make sure this doesn’t happen again.
“The Red Bull team in general has a great system of checks and balances to it, so for this to slip through the crack, it was enlightening that it could still happen with all the systems we have in place,” Frye said. “So we’ve had to add new systems. More internal policing, and it’s everybody.”
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