By alley - Apr 28, 2016, 2:02 PM ET

NASCAR: Stewart to pay $35,000 fine himself

Tony Stewart will pay the $35,000 fine

recently imposed on him by NASCAR

himself, and will donate the money offered to him by other drivers to charity.

Stewart was fined for making comments detrimental to the sport after he questioned NASCAR's commitment to safety related to lax enforcement of the rule enforcing the use of five lug nuts on each wheel.

The nine-member Drivers Council

immediately mobilized

behind Stewart and offered to pay the fine for him, but the three-time Cup champion said that the money provided by his peers will instead go to Autism Delaware, which was founded by NASCAR on Fox coordinating director Artie Kempner.

"I appreciated the Drivers Council support, but I didn't want them to pay the fine," Stewart said in a statement. "We decided as a group to donate the money to charity. Artie is such a good friend to all of us and his foundation does a lot of great work."

Stewart attracted NASCAR's ire after remarking that the series was 'playing a game with safety' with its attitude toward the lug nut rule. Although it sanctioned him, the series responded a few days later by

updating its rules

to emphasize that the five-nut rule will be enforced, although it did not fully explain how it will be policed.

The situation arose from the practice of not fastening all five lug nuts on each wheel in an effort save time during pitstops, although Greg Biffle noted prior to the rule change that any potential advantage was negated by the fact that all of the teams were doing the same thing.

"The left-rear tire is going to fall off of one of these cars and spin out, and the thing is going to go driver's side into the fence," Biffle said. "And we're going to hurt someone. For what purpose? There's no advantage when we all do the same thing. We should be tightening five lug nuts on the race car, period. There are five on there for a reason."