Deliberate Debris Cautions: Why Hasn't Nascar Addressed This Before?

Originally Posted on October 31, 2006 on Foxsports.com

On Sunday, a caution flag for debris with 35 laps remaining regulated Jeff Burton to a 13th place finish.  Burton was a lap down due to a cut tire and needed green flag pitstops to cycle through the field to get back on the lead lap.  The same caution flag that hurt Burton put Robby Gordon on the lead lap - as the "lucky dog."

NBC captured Robby Gordon's car driving by while a piece of rollbar padding flips into the air.  It is unclear whether the padding is thrown out of the car, flies out the back, or is merely run over by Gordon's car and sent floating.

Burton demanded that Nascar inspect every car and find out who was missing rollbar padding, fine the offender $100,000 and take 185 points from them.  Nascar is reportedly looking into the incident.

It isn't the first time a fortuitous caution benefited someone only to hurt another competitor.  Remember that at Homestead last year Tony Stewart got a mysterious caution which kept him on the lead lap and probably cost Casey Mears the win.

At the beginning of the season, someone lost a glove during a Busch race.  Nascar never figured out who the owner was.  At the end of the race, drivers called for Nascar to have each driver show their pair of gloves to prove that they hadn't caused the caution.

Not all attempts to cause a timely caution have gone unnoticed.  Reed Sorenson was caught throwning rollbar padding out of his car in a Busch race earlier this season.  Dale Earnhardt Jr. admitted to intentionally spinning at Bristol last year to bring out a caution to prevent going a lap down.

With all the in-car camera's on the track at any given moment, it should not be difficult to figure out who lost rollbar padding.  If Nascar can't tell from the tapes, then a simple inspection could tell where the padding came from. 

Determining whether it was tossed intentionally may be another matter.  The glove debris would seem to be intentional unless proven otherwise.

Significant penalties need to be handed out for intentionally creating a caution.  Like most crimes, Nascar should prove intent before levying such a penalty, which could prove difficult in most cases (things not fastened down well will fly out of a speeding car).  A one race suspension would prevent most from even thinking of deliberately bringing out a caution, wipe away any perceived advantage, and make the risk outweigh the reward.