NASCAR will penalize the four Joe Gibbs Racing NASCAR Cup Series teams 15 minutes each in opening practice for Sunday’s Pennzoil 400 for illegal modifcations to the fenders of their Toyota Camrys.
The No. 11 car driven by Denny Hamlin, No. 18 driven by Kyle Busch, No. 19 driven by Martin Truex Jr. and the No. 20 driven by Erik Jones were discovered to have bondo that was used to change the OEM shape of their fenders.
All @ToyotaRacing cars besides Suarez (Truex, Jones, Hamlin, Kyle Busch and Bell) will be held 15 minutes for first practice.#NASCAR said they used bondo to change the OEM shape of the fender. No further penalties are expected.
— Davey Segal (@DaveyCenter) February 21, 2020
No other penalties are expected. This is a similar infraction, which was discovered on the MBM Motorsports NASCAR Xfinity Series No. 66 team last week in Daytona.
In that instance, the No. 66 team had used bondo to fill holes on their front bumper cover. NASCAR discovered the body filler and penalized the team 50 points and fined them $50,000.
Of course, the difference is that the NASCAR Xfinity Series teams use composite bodies, which NASCAR has ruled can not be modified in any way.
