NASCAR GEARS UP
Safety plan in place for Sunday
Crew chief Chad Knaus won’t get a look at the car Hendrick Motorsports built for Darlington Raceway until he gets to the track Sunday morning, a few hours before the race.
Kurt Busch? He’s already sat in his Chip Ganassi Racing car and met with his crew chief.
The return to racing for NASCAR has brought with it a set of safety protocols that will be strictly enforced at the track Sunday when the Cup Series goes racing for the first time in more than two months after a pandemic-forced hiatus. The stock car series can only trust competitors to follow the guidelines away from the track — and teams appear to have different interpretations.
“No face-to-face or contact with these guys whatsoever. Everything has been on (Zoom) team meetings,” said Knaus, a seven-time championship winning crew chief. “That’s the recommendation by NASCAR for the traveling teams to stay as isolated as they can and try to keep everybody at the race track as healthy as we can. That’s the protocol we put into place and that’s what we’ve been abiding by.”
Not others.
Busch dropped by the Ganassi shop Thursday. He wanted a face-to-face meeting with crew chief Matt McCall before Darlington after two months of communicating via phone or computer.
“Just him and I, separated from the group,” Busch said. “There’s a shift change where the shop is empty for an hour, so it will be just him and I following (social) distancing.”
NASCAR reiterated its guidelines when asked for clarification.
“For a team to submit a participant to a roster, they must be symptom free for five days and not have been directly exposed to anyone with COVID-19,” NASCAR said. “We have made strong recommendations about operations in shops and responsible travel to the event.”
Teams are limited to 16 employees per car Sunday and that includes the driver, spotter and owner. More than half the team owners at the Cup Series level are over 65 years old and aren’t expected to attend because they are considered at risk for the coronavirus.
Hall of Famer Richard Petty told his son, Kyle, in an NBC Sports interview he will miss Darlington for the first time since 1950 when “my dad wouldn’t let me off school; school was starting the same day.”
Drivers were told to be at the track four hours ahead of the green flag Sunday. They will undergo a heath check including a temperature check, but no COVID-19 testing — a decision reached to ensure tests go elsehwere, not to NASCAR.
Once inside, drivers will be isolated in their motorhomes, away from their team, and wait to be called to the cars. Everyone will be required to wear a face mask, crews must maintain social distancing and high-fives, hugs and contact are barred.
NASCAR has warned of fines as high as $50,000 for not following rules at the track.