With so much attention placed on NASCAR’s new double-file restart procedure, Vice President of Competition Robin Pemberton took time Friday afternoon to help clear up some of the confusion.

Pemberton opened the nearly seventeen minute press conference by going over the basics of the new procedure, explaining many of the rules in place prior to Thursday’s announcement will remain in effect. Once the caution flag the field will be frozen flies just as before and the free pass will go to the first car one lap down. One change that will take place beginning Sunday is that the free pass rule will be in effect throughout the remainder of the event.

With the new procedure in place, once the field is given the one lap to go signal, those drivers that have not pitted and are between the pace car and the leader will be waved around to the rear of the field. When the field lines up for the restart, the lead lap cars will double up at the front of the field with the lapped cars that hit pit road next in line, followed by the free pass car, the wave around cars and then the penalty cars in the back of the pack.

“We started to look at the pros and cons of doing it,” Pemberton said of the double-file restart policy. “In so, it was not just about the lead lap cars, but what we could do about the cars that were trapped a lap down or give plenty of opportunities to teams or cars to make strategic moves to get the cars back in the race. So, this really is more than just double-file shootout restarts, it’s about lapped cars and about cars getting their laps back.”
The one-time crew chief and now NASCAR brass went on to point out the policy should help clear up the confusion that occurs when a caution comes out in the midst of green flag pit stops.

“If you look at the way Dover, we had an issue with cars getting trapped a lap down, Nationwide race at Charlotte, those are the types of things that confuse the fans on restarts and this should help clear some of that up and help give more opportunity for teams and cars and drivers that do get trapped a lap down or more than a lap down to get their laps back.”

With some drivers stating they wished the sanctioning body had waiting a little longer to implement this change – Jeff Burton explained he was “shocked” to see it in place so soon – Pemberton offered his assessment of why NASCAR chose to made the change for this weekend.

“It just seemed like strike while the iron is hot,” Pemberton said of the timing. “We came off a great All Star race, we had gotten a lot of great feedback from the fans, talked to many of the owners and drivers and we felt like as soon as we could get everything buttoned we would roll this out as soon as possible. We’ve still got two-thirds of the season left, there’s a lot of good racing.”

Double-file restarts were one of the many topics discussed in the town hall meetings held at the NASCAR R&D Center just weeks ago. With the majority of NASCAR owners and drivers in attendance and offering their opinions, many were not surprised this was the first development to come from those meetings.

"We talked about all kinds of stuff,” Pemberton added. “When we were able to talk to the drivers as a group and realize that many, if not 100% close to that, would be supportive of a change of this nature. They felt like it would be better for the racing, better opportunities, more opportunities to get laps back and be competitive. So, this was just one of the things that we talked about and came out of that meeting. I don’t foresee but maybe a few little tweaks coming through the rest of the year and they could be in a lot of different areas or in a few different areas. They were good meetings and I think everyone came out of them with something positive.”

There are sure to be hiccups and tweaks made to the procedure, just like anything new NASCAR tries. When NASCAR decided to eliminate racing back to the caution and freezing the field, it took time for teams and fans to adjust. When the free pass was implemented, it took time to adjust. This new procedure is no different and this weekend’s race at Pocono will be an interesting test of NASCAR’s ability to keep their drivers in line, but after hearing what Pemberton had to say, there appears to be little doubt this will not work.

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