NASCAR has explained its reason for giving Kyle Busch back his position in the running order after an overtime crash at Nashville Superspeedway.
The incident occurred in the first of five overtime attempts. Kyle Larson made contact with Ross Chastain and sent the No. 1 Chevrolet into the outside wall. Busch, who lined up behind Chastain, bounced off the wall after going high to avoid the crash. Busch continued to slow while staying up by the wall while other drivers navigated past the wreck.
According to Cup Series Managing Director Brad Moran, NASCAR deemed Busch not involved in the incident. This is why the driver of the No. 8 Chevrolet was able to move back to fourth for the second overtime restart.
Larson gets into Chastain and multiple cars are collected! pic.twitter.com/PMwujkFIG7
— NASCAR (@NASCAR) July 1, 2024
"It's not so much getting his spot back -- his spots weren't taken away because our rule clearly states that you must maintain a reasonable speed and reasonable speed is for what track conditions (are) at the time," Moran said during his appearance on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.
"Kyle actually... we don't want to encourage drivers to stay on the gas and just bang their way through. What he did was he avoided the incident. We deemed him not involved in that incident. He didn't stop. If he had stopped, he probably would have ended up toward the back of the field.
"But he was scored in the fourth-place position when that caution came out, and he didn't get into (Ross Chastain) or (Kyle Larson) and made very slight contact with the wall. We would deem that as not being involved in that incident, and that's why he was able to restart where he was scored."
Moran added that NASCAR used scoring loop No. 4 to freeze the field at the time of the caution. This scoring loop was before nearly the entire field passed Busch.
While NASCAR deemed Busch not to be involved in the incident, the official post-race report listed him in the caution. He was also on the Damaged Vehicle Policy during the race.
Getting the spots back did not benefit Busch. He crashed on the following restart as Larson ran out of gas and caused a stack-up. Chase Elliott hit Busch from behind and spun him into the outside wall.