IndyCar: KVSH team fined following Bourdais victory

KVSH Racing has been fined $5,000 after Sebastien Bourdais' race-winning car from last weekend's IndyCar race at Milwaukee was found to be three pounds underweight.

The series offered no details of the infraction but the margin of error has been confirmed to RACER by a senior team member. IndyCar merely stated that a post-race inspection determined that the car was in breach of Rule 14.3.1.1, which specifies a minimum weight of 1,600 lbs for road/street courses and short ovals.

It is the third time in four seasons that a race-winning car has failed a post-race technical inspection. The Dale Coyne Racing car driven to victory in Houston by Carlos Huertas last year was later found to be in breach of rules dictating the fuel tank capacity and rear wing dimensions, while an illegal aero part was discovered on Justin Wilson's sidepods following his win – also with Coyne – at Texas in 2012.

IndyCar has faced criticism in the past over the relatively minor penalties imposed for irregularities with race-winning cars. However the series' competition boss Derrick Walker explained last year that a zero-tolerance approach would be unrealistic, and that the minor punishments reflected the relatively minor nature of the infractions.

Meanwhile, Chevrolet and Honda were docked 20 and 100 manufacturer points, respectively, for engines that failed to reach their minimum mileage at Milwaukee.

Chevrolet was penalized for the engine failure in Stefano Coletti's car, while Honda was hit with the same penalty for failures on the cars of James Jakes (Schmidt), both Coyne entries, and Wilson and Marco Andretti's Andretti Autosport entries. Following the adjustments, Chevrolet leads Honda by 1213 points to 899.

Originally on Autosport.com