By Robert Schloemer, NASCAR Fan Contributer – Follow on Twitter @SchloemerZ
*Editor’s note: The Schloemer Zone is a place for NASCAR fans to hear the ranting and raving of a true NASCAR fan — Robert Schloemer. Schloemer is not a trained journalist, and has no skin in the game financially, he is just a huge NASCAR fan and has agreed to bring his thoughts and opinions in a periodic column on The Final Lap.
Kevin Harvick absolutely dominated the Texas race. There is no denying that. Harvick has been the class of the field this season winning eight races and should have probably won more (Kansas, Talladega, Dover just off the top of my head, but was cursed with pit road issues and bad luck). Winning both stages and the checkered flag, Harvick looked to be returning to his dominating ways with no pit road issues in the AAA Texas 500.
Wednesday, NASCAR social media roared to life with news that the No. 4 car failed inspection with a spoiler issue. The team was hit with an L1 penalty which result in both crew chief and car chief being banned from the track for two races, a $75,000 dollar fine and a loss of the maximum 40 points for an L1 penalty.
This was big, and it shook up the playoff picture like I have never seen before. However, NASCAR released little to no information as to what the infraction consisted of other than the fact that it pertained to the rear spoiler.
The internet went wild without information. What was wrong with the spoiler? How was it missed during prerace inspection? How was a part supplied by NASCAR failing the post-race inspection? And of course, my personal favorite, NASCAR is penalizing Harvick on purpose to give Toyota the upper-hand.
I even found pictures of the spoiler on the car from Sunday’s race and compared it to other cars from this season and found nothing visible that caused it to fail. This penalty was huge. Why was it so huge? NASCAR fans wanted to know!
Fast forward to about 7:30 pm and NASCAR is finally ready to dish out the details of what they found.
The findings were explosive. NASCAR found that the rear spoiler on the car wasn’t even the spoiler they had provided to the No. 4 team. Instead, Stewart-Haas Racing had manufactured their own piece and installed it in place of the NASCAR provided spoiler.
If you don’t know, there are two parts that NASCAR provides to each and every car for each race. The rear spoiler is one of those and each and every one is exactly the same and it is not to be tampered with. You don’t touch it.
Think back to 2016, Chase Elliott had a piece of tape on his spoiler and was hit with a L1 penalty. The SHR spoiler was moved .3 inches to the right. It may seem like nothing, but at 200 mph this gives an extremely large aerodynamic push to the car, especially affecting handling in a corner.
Is Harvick’s season starting to make sense now?
So then, people asked, how was this not caught? Well here is the answer. Seeing as NASCAR provides the part and they know every spoiler is exactly the same, the inspection station doesn’t even look at the spoiler. The spoiler is not an inspected part. Evidently NASCAR never thought a team would have the audacity to make their own and slip it on while no one is looking.
This is enraging.
This goes well beyond going into the gray area with a fender measurement or flirting with a ride height measurement. This is bold face, we are smarter than NASCAR, example of cheating. The ONLY way this was caught was that an official noticed that Harvick’s spoiler just didn’t look right. That’s how they were caught.
So, this leads to a bigger question: How long has this been going on?
The talk of the season has been the sheer dominance of the SHR team as a whole, and especially Kevin Harvick.
How many times did they use their own spoiler? How many races did Kevin Harvick absolutely blow the field away? This rule infraction raises a serious question on the No. 4 team’s entire season.
I’m not an official and I’ve never worked for NASCAR, but to me this once seemingly huge penalty dealt to the No. 4 team, seems more like a slap on the wrist now that details have come to light.
SHR knew exactly what they were doing, and they prepared for when they got caught. They brought their Phoenix cars to Texas as they are already prepared. Their Homestead car is also already done, its ready to be shipped out.
A loss of a crew chief and a car chief are not that big of a deal. In my opinion, the No. 4 car should be ejected from the playoffs. It’s that simple. He wasn’t dominant this season, he was cheating his way to countless victories.
NASCAR really screwed the pooch on this one, and if Harvick wins the title this year, there needs to be a giant asterisk next to his name.
Photo: @DiecastFans on Twitter
The Final Lap Weekly 
ok then. Great commentary. Thanks for sharing The Final Lap!
Thanks tom!
Hahahaha!
First of all if you think that this was the work of an “eagle eyed” NASCAR inspector, let me sell you some prime ocean front property here in Iowa! Just walking by the car nobody is going to discern .3 of an inch. Somebody spilled the beans on this one. The average NASCAR inspector is more likely to catch a cold than to catch someone cheating.
Now, while I’m not condoning what Harvick’s team did, I can also tell you that .3 of an inch isn’t going to make enough of an aerodynamic advantage to really matter. The reason for the penalty is because he got caught, not because it made much of a difference, if any.
As someone who’s originally from just outside Charlotte & grew up with the sport as well as having many people involved in it as acquaintances & personal friends in some cases, & has followed the sport for fifty years, (& even written about it as well), this really isn’t cheating. It was stupid, & yes it broke the rule, but it pales next to some of the rule breaking of the past.
Much like with the manufactured “outrage” at Logano’s bump & run move on Truex, this hysteria over such a minor rules violation is just one more example of how clueless & wimpy the sport’s fans have become. No wonder the sport’s dying, if people are up in arms over such things. Grow a pair!
And just FYI, I’m NOT a fan of Harvick, so my comments weren’t in support of him or what the team did. Such had wringing hysteria as I see posted constantly now is what I find ludicrous,
This is the only hole I see in your theory about 0.3 of an inch not being an advantage — if it’s not an advantage, then why even mount the spoiler 0.3 of an inch to the right? Why not put it exactly where it’s supposed to be?
Simply, because it is an advantage. Perhaps a small minute advantage, but an advantage none the less.
More air to the right rear of the spoiler creates more downforce on the right rear tire, helping the car power threw a turn with more speed.
Agree to disagree.
Waste of time reading this tripe. Another wanna be web writer pleads his thoughts to the masses
I’ve never once claimed to be a journalist. Cool your jets, harvick will probably still win the championship. You have no reason to worry.
In my opinion, I think all this inspection stuff is just garbage. How can the race mfgs and drivers learn anything about building race cars if all the cars are cookie cutter designed. I say that if you want to race then do what it takes to win. 😉
Russ