Who does a driver have to trust? 'The tire guy' says Dale Junior

   NASCAR this season stopped policing whether lug nuts were loose or missing on tires during pit stops. Instead, the sanctioning body has left that duty to the teams, although a team can face a serious penalty should it lose a wheel during the race. 

   However, the first person who knows whether a team made a mistake is the driver and Saturday night at Texas Motor Speedway, several were forced to make unscheduled pit stops for missing lug nuts or loose wheels.

   Dale Earnhardt Jr. spoke at length after Saturday night's race about the dilemma teams find themselves in on this issue and the trust drivers must place in their pit crews and particularly those who change tires.

   "I think we all were a little worried when NASCAR said we were going to have to police it because that's just a big change from the norm and what we've done in the past. The question is can we police ourselves? NASCAR doesn't have the officials on pit road to do it anymore, so they made a change and put it on our laps. You've got understand how serious a situation is," Earnhardt explained.

   "You get out there on the race track and we got the corner speeds are 18 miles an hour faster in the middle of the corner, and if you lose a wheel going that fast, it's not going to be very good. So you have to have guys that are up front and honest that you trust. If your tire guy done makes a mistake, if he makes a mistake and raises his hand and says 'Look, man, I made a mistake,' you catch it right then, right under the caution, you get it fixed, you get a chance to get back going. Otherwise if you don't speak up, you get a bad vibration, the driver is going to come in, and he ain't going to knock his head against the fence out there when you think the tire is coming off and you lose a lap. Then you're in big trouble.

   "It's a bit of a process, but I think that the guys, the tire guys that are honest and feel confident about I got them tight or didn't get them tight, that's the kind of guys you want coming over the wall to help you. You need them guys looking out for you the same way you look out for them."

Next change on pit road? Jeff Gordon says 'The speed limit is the speed limit'

   Four-time Sprint Cup Series champion Jeff Gordon is a big supporter of the new camera enforcement procedures on pit road this season and he'd like NASCAR to take it yet another step.

   Gordon believes it's time NASCAR do away with speed or timing lines on pit road and just enforce the speed limit on pit road from beginning to end.

   Currently, NASCAR monitors the average speed of a car between timing lines. So in theory, a car can go faster than the limit in one area if it goes slower in another.

   "I think that’s the next step. We’ve got to get rid of these speed lines. It doesn’t make any sense. The speed limit is the speed limit. You should never be able to break the speed limit," Gordon said. "You should carry the speed limit all the way down pit road. What we do is find pit stalls to try to get around that. So we’re ramping up and slowing down and that’s what got us in Martinsville. We were just too aggressive with it.”

Richard Childress Racing's appeal of NASCAR tire penalty will be heard next week

   The National Motorsports Appeals Panel will hear Richard Childress Racing's appeal of an unprecedented NASCAR penalty for tire tampering on Thursday, April 16. 

   Until the hearing, the fines and suspensions as part of the penalty will be placed on hold but the 75-point driver and car owner penalties remain in effect. Should RCR win its appeal those points will be restored. 

   NASCAR fined Luke Lambert, crew chief of driver Ryan Newman's No. 31 team, $125,000 and suspended him for six races, including all non-points events during that time period. He was also placed on probation through the end of the season.

   In addition, tire technician James Bender and engineer Philip Surgen were each suspended six races and placed on probation through the end of the year.

   NASCAR found the team had tampered with tires used in the March 22 Sprint Cup Series race at Fontana, Calif., and send the tires to a third party to confirm its findings before issuing the P5 penalty - the second most serious in the penalty scale.

Read more here: http://www.charlotteobserver.com/sports/article17213183.html#storylink=cpy

At Monday's White House Easter Egg Roll, Jeff Gordon must also meet a #GimmeFive challenge

   Four-time NASCAR Sprint Cup Series champion Jeff Gordon, “Black-ish” star Anthony Anderson and tennis star Caroline Wozniacki will join the lineup of guests stopping by “Live with Kelly and Michael’s” special broadcast from the White House on Monday.

   

   For the first time, the full hour of the morning talk show will originate live from the White House, during the annual Easter Egg Roll. The show also includes a sit down with First Lady Michelle Obama and "Nashville" star Connie Britton.

   In addition to a sight-seeing tour of D.C. and his kids, Ella and Leo, participating in the Easter Egg Roll, Gordon has also been challenged to do five push-ups on the show as part of the #GimmeFive social media fitness challenge initiated by the First Lady.

   Watch the video below to see who challenged Gordon:

NASCAR levies heavy penalties to Richard Childress Racing's No. 31 team for altering tires

   NASCAR has levied unprecedented penalties to Richard Childress Racing's No. 31 Sprint Cup Series team for altering tires.

   Crew chief Luke Lambert has been fined $125,000 and suspended from the next six Cup races plus any non-points races during that span and placed on NASCAR probation through Dec. 31. James Bender, team tire technician, and Philip Surgen, team engineer, have been suspended from the next six Cup races, plus any non-points races, and placed on NASCAR probation through Dec. 31. 

   Driver Ryan Newman and car owner Richard Childress each have been penalized with the loss of 75 championship driver and championship car owner points. 

   “NASCAR takes very seriously its responsibility to govern and regulate the rules of the sport in order to ensure competitive balance,” said Steve O’Donnell, Executive Vice President and Chief Racing Development Officer. “We’ve been very clear that any modifications to race vehicle tires is an unacceptable practice and will not be tolerated.”

NASCAR statement regarding Indiana's recently enacted 'religious freedom' legislation

Statement from NASCAR Senior Vice President

and Chief Communications Officer Brett Jewkes on the Indiana Legislation

   DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. (March 31, 2015) – “NASCAR is disappointed by the recent legislation passed in Indiana. We will not embrace nor participate in exclusion or intolerance. We are committed to diversity and inclusion within our sport and therefore will continue to welcome all competitors and fans at our events in the state of Indiana and anywhere else we race.”

   To read more on the widely-criticized Indiana law, go here.

Joe Gibbs' full statement at Martinsville (Va.) Speedway on Sunday

JOE GIBBS, Team Owner, Joe Gibbs Racing

Statement

   "I will address J.D.'s (Gibbs, president, Joe Gibbs Racing) situation. J.D. at our team meeting earlier this week, he got up and basically he said, 'I know God has a plan and God puts us through things for a reason.' I think J.D. gains his strength from the fact that he has a personal relationship with the Lord and I have to tell you that he's my hero. I kind of watch him and I don't know if anybody has ever dealt with anything as crazy as J.D. does. He went through a situation with his son Taylor having leukemia at two and we fought through that for about three or four years. By the way, appreciate all of you all's prayers for Taylor and Taylor's doing great today. Like I said, J.D. through his entire life has probably been the craziest person that I've ever been around or knew. Basically, his situation medically – there's very few answers. We've been dealing with this for about six months and basically what the doctor's say is that they really don't know. J.D. has lived a very active lifestyle. All the things that he's done in his life physically he's loved all sporting events and it's everything from football to snowboarding, racing cars, racing motor bikes – he's lived in a lot of ways for him, he loved all those things. We can't point to any one serious thing that happened to him, certainly any injury is a possibility that led us into some of the symptoms that he's experiencing now. I wanted to address the NASCAR community. I have to tell you that as a group, from all the contact that we've had, the people praying for us and the people reaching out to us, whether it was through Taylor's situation or now through 

   "J.D.'s situation, it's been just unbelievable for us as a family. I include the media in that. All of you have always treated us and J.D. in particular with such a caring attitude and you've always treated us fairly. Certainly everybody in the community out there, we've got so many different things and people praying for us right now, it's real encouragement for us and I think that's one of the thrills that we love about what we do and of being a part of your family. We've been dealing with this for about six months so as far as the management team for Joe Gibbs Racing, we have a senior management team and most of our people have been in place for the full 24 years – it's amazing really. I think very few people have noticed anything or any difference in the way we operate with the race team. The good thing there is that J.D. and I share the same responsibilities. If I'm not there for a particular reason, J.D. will be there and if J.D. is not there for some reason, I'll be there. As he goes through treatment, he will probably be doing less at the race track because he has a full week that demands quite a bit from him as he goes through treatment. You will probably see less of him at the race track, but he'll be there on a day-to-day basis with the race team and be in all of our meetings and all of the key decisions that we make, J.D.'s going to have a huge impact on that. 

   "So for our whole family, Coy (Gibbs), who's primary focus is the motocross team, but Coy also shares a lot with all of our big decisions with any of our racing and he'll have a huge impact on anything we do in the future and working with us and his responsibilities – he has a lot of them, but he's a very big part of our family and our race team and everything going forward. Coy will have a big input on that. I just want to kind of finish by saying this is a personal thing for us. We appreciate the way you guys handle everything and we certainly will appreciate all the prayers going forward. Thank you."