WINSTON CUP Appeal of Martin's penalty to be heard

Without the infraction on Nov. 3, the driver would be 25 points closer to leader Tony Stewart.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
The appeal of a NASCAR penalty that hurt Mark Martin's bid for his first Winston Cup championship will be heard Saturday.
The 43-year-old driver is 89 points behind leader Tony Stewart entering the season-ending race Sunday in Homestead, Fla. Martin could be 25 points closer had he not been penalized for using an unapproved spring during the race Nov. 3 in Rockingham, N.C.
Stewart can clinch his first title by finishing 22nd, should Martin win the race and lead the most laps. But a restoration of 25 points would force Stewart to finish 13th should Martin have his best possible result.
The panel
George Silbermann, chairman of the three-member National Auto Racing Commission, and two commissioners he will appoint will hear the appeal at Miami-Homestead Speedway.
"I just wish we weren't having to go through this," Martin said. "My hope is something wonderful will happen for us at Homestead. If it doesn't, it doesn't."
If the penalty stands, Martin said he just hopes it won't affect the outcome of the title race.
"I'm not bitter," he said. "It doesn't bother me unless it falls into that area where the 25 points would make a difference in the championship."
Roush Racing president Geoff Smith said Wednesday it was decided to appeal because the spring had an "inconsequential deviation" that had "absolutely no effect on the fairness of competition." He called the 25-point penalty a "draconian remedy."'
He waited the maximum 10 days before filing the appeal, saying he wanted to be sure the team was not "doing anything stupid."
At its postrace inspection, NASCAR determined that the left front coil spring on Martin's Ford had approximately 43/8 turns of coil. The required minimum number is 41/2. A spring with fewer coils would compress more and aid the car's handling.
Out of the box
The Roush team said the coil came out of the box from the manufacturer and was put on the car in good faith.
Besides docking Martin 25 championship points, NASCAR penalized Roush 25 owners points and fined crew chief Ben Leslie $5,000.
"Roush is a big player in NASCAR and we understand why they disagree with this decision," NASCAR spokesman Jim Hunter said. "That's why we have this appeals process."
Smith says this case is different from two previous instances this year in which teams were penalized 25 points for altering springs to gain a competitive advantage.
"In fairness, [points] should not be used in these situations where innocent mistakes are made," he said. "The penalty should be smaller than it was."
Smith said the Roush team did a complete inventory of its springs and found one, still in its box, identical to the one used on the car at North Carolina Speedway. He added there were several others that were found to be "marginal."
Smith said there will be no lawsuit against the spring manufacturer because "litigation and racing do not go hand-in-hand, and we don't want to be dealing with this into 2003 or beyond."
Bizarre season
Hunter said a penalty possibly affecting the championship is "just another twist, another quirk in what has been a somewhat bizarre year.
"Nobody has been able to take control of this championship all year," he said. "I think this is one of the things that makes our championship so intriguing: every event counts."