Cup -- Kurt Busch on the Pole, JGR Rules Violation at Michigan

Image by Photography by Hank via Flickr

Kurt Busch won his third pole in a row, edging David Reutimann by three one-thousandths of a second Saturday to take the pole for Sunday's Heluva Good! 400 at Michigan International Speedway.

Busch turned a lap on the two-mile track in 38.156 seconds (188.669 mph) to edge Reutimann's 38.159-second effort.  It was Busch's 15th career pole and the fourth in a row for Penske Racing.  Brad Keselowski started the streak at Charlotte in May.

Matt Kenseth will start third, followed by Brian Vickers and Regan Smith.  Series points leader Carl Edwards starts 23rd.  Tony Raines, Brian Keselowski and Mike Skinner did not make the race.  (Race lineup)


The oil pans for all three Joe Gibbs Racing cars -- those of Kyle Busch, Denny Hamlin and Joey Logano -- were confiscated by NASCAR during opening day inspection Friday.  The teams had to change out the oil pans before practice began Friday.  The confiscated parts were 25-30 pounds heavier than those normally used and could give an aerodynamic advantage by lowering the cars center of gravity.

Because the oil pans were never used in competition, NASCAR seems to be inclined to treat this as a simple case of failing to submit the part for approval.  In that case, the teams might be penalized financially, not by taking points away.

Jeff Gordon weighed in on Twitter...

All I'm going to say about Gibbs cars oil pan is that we had 100 point penalty for a flared left front fender that never went on track. #JGFri Jun 17 18:49:58 via Twitter for BlackBerry®Jeff Gordon
JeffGordonWeb

Sprint Cup Series Director John Darby explained that this would be similar to Michael Waltrip Racing using unapproved radiator mounts at Texas last year.  In that case, the crew chiefs were fined $25,000 and put on probation.

"The whole issue has absolutely nothing to do with whether the oil pans are legal or illegal," Darby said. "But, quite frankly...we never had the opportunity to make that decision.

"When we open the rulebook, we don't have to flip through pages to get back to the oil-pan section. We open the book and we stop on the first page and the very first paragraph says you've got to have stuff approved before you can use it. We don't have to make a judgment of the pan. We don't have to decide whether it's too heavy or too light. We don't have to decide if it's an aerodynamic device or not an aerodynamic device...

"The Hendrick fender flares [in 2007], every square inch of the car body, there's a drawing that supports how exactly it has to be," Darby said. "The wing mounts from Dale Earnhardt Jr [in 2007], those were an exact part that had to comply with the design drawings that were given to all the teams.

"Oil pans, the teams have flexibility to work on them with oil pickups, depths and a little bit of widths. There's some real basic parameters that surround the oil pans, but there is some leniency to work on an oil pan, much like you would have a leniency to port a cylinder head to your liking."

  Penalties will be announced Monday or Tuesday.