Wallace argues he 'did not advance' his position with penalized yellow line move

NASCAR deemed that Bubba Wallace went below the yellow line while racing for the win on Monday morning, wiping away a second-place finish at EchoPark Speedway.

Wallace, however, countered that he did not advance his position in making the move.

It occurred on the final lap when he shot to the left on the backstretch and got underneath Carson Hocevar and Ryan Blaney. The move put them three-wide for the race lead, which they carried through Turns 3 and 4 and nearly to the start/finish line for a photo finish. NASCAR quickly reviewed the finish, and Wallace was moved to 29th in the order of finish.

“It says advancing your position, which I did not do,” Wallace said. “I stayed third, and I was all over the brakes to make sure I did not advance. As soon as I turned, I was like, ‘I’m going to wreck,’ and got on the brakes, kept it under me, and still ended up side by side. That move should have propelled me to the lead, and it didn’t because I knew it was wrong because my car did not like that move.

“We’ll see what we can do, but I did not advance my position. I stayed third from the entry of [Turn] 3 all until 50 yards away.”

In the NASCAR Rule Book, bullet point J in section 8.3.2 addresses superspeedway events. It reads, “If NASCAR determines that a vehicle goes beneath the double painted lines to improve its position it will be black-flagged. If NASCAR determines that a vehicle forces another vehicle beneath the double painted lines in an effort to advance its own position, the vehicle may be black-flagged.”

In addition to the result, the penalty also carried a 27-point swing for Wallace.

"That’s massive for us,” Wallace said. “Everybody behind us in points is like, ‘Oh, 23.’ They see that, and they’re licking their chops. The position that we’re in, we’re not safe. We need to figure out what we need to do moving forward because, again, I did not advance my position.”

Wallace and his team ended up going to the NASCAR hauler to see what they could do about the penalty and spent about 31 minutes meeting with NASCAR. A team can protest a finish for review within 20 minutes of the results being posted, but an in-race penalty is not appealable.

NASCAR made its ruling on the basis that Wallace advanced his position from third to second place.