NASCAR bans the ‘Hail Melon’

Driver Ross Chastain offered some of the memorable moments of final yr’s NASCAR season.

Don’t count on to see it replicated anytime quickly.

Needing to maneuver up a few locations within the closing lap of the Xfinity 500 at Martinsville Speedway to qualify for the ultimate 4 within the final race of the season, Chastain put his Chevrolet into the wall, and rode it across the monitor, rocketing into fifth place. That end was adequate to place him within the last 4 for the season finale.

The transfer has typically been known as a “Hail Melon,” NASCAR’s model of the Hail Mary you see on the gridiron.

Nonetheless, the transfer got here with some criticism, and now NASCAR is stepping in. Forward of the 2023 season, the game introduced that comparable strikes would now be a penalty.

Citing an current rule, NASCAR introduced that such a transfer would now lead to a penalty. The rule in query — 10.5.2.6.A — states that “Security is a high precedence for NASCAR and NEM (NASCAR Occasion Administration). Subsequently, any violations deemed to compromise the security of an Occasion or in any other case pose a harmful danger to the security of Opponents, Officers, spectators, or others are handled with the best diploma of seriousness. Security violations can be dealt with on a case-by-case foundation.”

In asserting the emphasis on the prevailing rule Elton Sawyer, NASCAR’s senior vp of competitors, mentioned this in regards to the ending at Martinsville: “Principally, if there’s an act that we really feel that compromises the security of our opponents, officers, spectators,” Sawyer mentioned, “we’re going to take that severely. And we’ll penalize for that act going ahead. Principally, what it could be is a lap or time penalty on the finish of the race, in order that transfer at Martinsville can be a penalty.”

Nonetheless, it was unlikely that Chastain would duplicate his Martinsville Hail Melon anytime quickly. Whereas it labored, it was not essentially the most pleasant expertise. “Why it labored? I don’t know, however I’ve no concepts or plans to ever do this once more as a result of it was not nice,” Chastain mentioned earlier than the season’s last race.