Photo Credit: Noel Lanier
Last week before the Geico 500 at Talladega Superspeedway, NASCAR made a change in for the rule regarding lug nuts and mandating that all five lug nuts must be tightened at all times through the race. The rule was originally the same before, but had been changed during the 2015 season as part of NASCAR new pit road technology initiative which once implemented officials were no longer being required to be every pit stall.
“I think it’s a step in the right direction,” said Dale Earnhardt Jr. “It’s not all the way there and I don’t think NASCAR has the technology to go all the way. But I think it’s something that they are interested in improving over time.
“The only way we could fix it today is to put all those officials back on pit road. That is not an option. So, facing that, I think that they did what they could do today.”
Once the technology was enforced more teams were pushing the limits of only tightening only three or four, which caused wheels to be loose. Driver and owner of Stewart-Haas Racing, Tony Stewart spoke out about this and safety issues regarding this after the race at Bristol Motor Speedway last month.
“For a while you had half the people arguing that it policed itself and then you had another group over her that thought it was a safety issue,” said the North Carolina native. “It appears that we have everybody on the same team, which I think is great for moving in a better direction. I’m happy that they are making some choices that are good for drivers.”
Back in 2015 the NASCAR Sprint Cup Driver’s Council was formed to have drivers meet with NSCAR to discuss issues form competition to safety. Earhardt Jr. is part of this Council along with drivers Kyle Busch, Denny Hamlin, Kevin Harvick, Jimmie Johnson, Brad Keselowksi, Kyle Larson, Joey Logano and Stewart.
“I think what we are doing is pretty amazing,” he said. “At first it was NASCAR and the drivers getting together. That was incredible. We thought we would never really have that opportunity to sit down and spend time with everyone that needed to be in the room in the same room.
“We just now started this opportunity to talk to more with the RTA and the competition committee which is really helping NASCAR, the teams and the driver because the drivers all come in there and say these are the parts and pieces we want.
“So we talked to the teams and allow them to be the parts and pieces guys, the details guys. It’ now up to the drivers to say this what we want to feel, this is what we think would make good racing if the cars drove in this matter. It’s up to the RTA and NASCAR to come to an agreement on the direction the cars go technically.
“It used to be just the drivers, when we started the council it was drivers just pounding their fist on the table and it had turned into so much more than that. It’s really productive.”
Next up is the Go Bowling 400 at Kansas Speedway on Saturday May 7th, where Junior in 19 starts has three top-five, and nine top-10 finishes.
