Justin Haley disqualified after P17 finish at COTA for failing to meet minimum weight post-race
A little extra drama after the fact at COTA. Justin Haley has been disqualified after a solid run of P17 for the Rick Ware Racing driver. Haley sniffed the top-10 at one point today but was unable to keep up the pace in the final green flag run to end today’s NASCAR race.
Justin Haley received the disqualification after his car failed to meet minimum weight requirements after the race. This is a hard blow to the No. 51 team as they had a strong run today in Texas. However, NASCAR found an issue with the car and issued a penalty.
There won’t be any further penalties to Haley as a result of this. The DQ is the only punishment from NASCAR.
P17 in today’s race would have tied his best finish of the season. Rick Ware Racing looks for those top-20 results and are slowly trying to build their program up. This year they have a strong alliance with RFK Racing and are operating out of that shop.
Justin Haley will be given a DQ and won’t receive any points for his efforts today. A hard end to a long day for Haley. These drivers put it all on the line today and this COTA track is a tough one physically to get through.
Justin Haley gets DQd, William Byron wins
Things didn’t end so well for Justin Haley today but William Byron had a fantastic day. As the winner of today’s race, Byron becomes the first multi-race winner in the Cup Series this season. It is the third year in a row that Byron has accomplished that feat. The last driver to do that? Jeff Gordon.
Byron led about two-thirds of the 68 laps in today’s race. He was dominant and showed that he still has speed despite some not-so-great performances in the last few weeks. Byron adds this COTA win to his Daytona 500 victory. He is the first Daytona 500 winner to win multiple races in a season since Denny Hamlin in 2020.
No, this race didn’t have an exciting overtime restart. There wasn’t any wacky ending or big surprise at the end for Byron. But the 24 team earned this the way racers love to earn wins. They went out there and just beat everybody fair and square.
By the time the final pit stops filtered the field one more time, William Byron came out on top. He was able to get off of pit road three seconds faster than Ross Chastain on green flag pit stops, opening the door for him to race to the checkered flag.