Errant call has NASCAR on defense

The error came against Kyle Busch in the Busch Series race Friday.

BRISTOL, Tenn. (AP) — NASCAR’s errant call against Kyle Busch was still being discussed Saturday, as drivers wondered what kind of recourse they have when they don’t agree with a call.

NASCAR said Busch crossed the commitment line for pit road — and then didn’t pit — during a caution in Friday night’s Busch Series race and ordered him to forfeit his second-place position. Although his Hendrick Motorsports team disagreed with the call, Busch served the penalty and dropped back to 28th, which cost him a shot at the win.

Too late to rectify

Shortly after the race resumed, NASCAR said Busch did not cross the line and should not have been penalized. It was too late to rectify, though, and Busch had to drive through the field to finish fourth.

During the driver meeting before Saturday night’s Nextel Cup event, four-time series champion Jeff Gordon asked NASCAR what teams should do going forward if they disagree with a call. Race director David Hoots said the teams should convey their thoughts to a NASCAR official, who will radio it to the scoring tower for further review.

Meanwhile, NASCAR was still forced to defend how the error happened.

Robin Pemberton, vice president of competition, said the pit road official initially called the violation. When the team complained, NASCAR asked the official to reconfirm and the official again said Busch was in violation.

Replay feed failed

But when NASCAR attempted to watch a replay of the incident, their feed had failed and there was no immediate video to view. Believing the ruling was correct, the race restarted.

Many wondered why NASCAR didn’t wait until it had a video replay to resume the race. NASCAR officials got the feed a few minutes later and recognized their error.

“We don’t rule the sport by video, we use it to confirm different situations,” Pemberton said. “When we can’t find video to review, we rule by our officials and we had no reason to dispute our own call.

“We’re human and we’re no different from most other sports. Football has end zone calls, sideline calls, and baseball has balls and strikes. Pick any sport. Just because they’ve got a strike zone superimposed on a camera, you can’t regulate your balls and strikes like that. It’s still an umpire or referee making split-second calls.”

That was little consolation to crew chief Alan Gustafson, who said he wants a camera positioned at the pit road commitment line to prevent similar incidents going forward.