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Kyle Busch suspended for Cup race for
actions in Truck race
yahoo sports
Kyle Busch has beeen parked for Sunday’s Sprint Cup Series race and
Saturday’s Nationwide Series race at Texas Motor Speedway after
intentionally crashing Ron Hornaday in Friday night’s Camping World
Truck Series race.
“[Busch being parked for Friday night’s race is] done under section
9.12 of the rulebook, that gives NASCAR the authority to react during a
race weekend. And following the event and after a good deal of
conversation and discussion, NASCAR has decided to maintain that parked
position on the driver of the 18 truck for the balance of the weekend,”
NASCAR president Mike Helton said Saturday morning.
“So basically what that means is that Kyle Busch will not be
participating today or tomorrow in the NASCAR event here in Texas.”
Joe Gibbs, Busch’s team owner in the Cup and Nationwide Series, was at
home in North Carolina and not at the track Friday night. He flew to
Texas Saturday morning and met with NASCAR officials and Busch. Gibbs
said he “trusts” NASCAR’s decision. He would not divulge what he told
Busch in their 1-on-1 meeting, but did say they “needed to get out here
and meet with everybody we needed to meet with.” In other words, Busch,
who was not kicked out of the track, needs to make the rounds to
apologize.
Busch’s suspension is the first for a driver after the “Boys have at
it” declaration from NASCAR — a statement that’s been pointed to
numerous times over the past two years when it comes to driver
discipline.
“The responsibility that over the past two or three seasons we’ve given
back to the drivers came, I think, with a very clear understanding that
there could be a line that got crossed,” Helton said. “And as annoying
as the comments that I’ve made personally in the past of ‘we’ll know it
when we see it’ might have been, we saw it last night.”
Michael McDowell will drive Busch’s No. 18 car on Sunday.
Busch is currently in seventh place in the Chase for the Sprint Cup
standings, 57 points behind points leader Carl Edwards with three races
to go. Busch met with series officials before the start of Saturday
morning’s first practice session at Texas Motor Speedway.
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