NASCAR confirm penalty for playoff driver after St Louis inspection

A NASCAR playoff driver and his team are facing a penalty after an issue was discovered with their car post-race at Gateway.

The NASCAR Xfinity and Cup Series are in action at World Wide Technology Raceway this weekend, just outside of St. Louis, with the Xfinity Series stars having kicked things off on Saturday night with their regular-season finale.

The Nu Way 200 Sauced by Blues Hog was won by none other than Connor Zilisch in the No. 88 Chevrolet for JR Motorsports - his ninth victory of the season.

READ MORE: NASCAR Results Today: Playoff star suffers DNF disaster at St Louis

NASCAR confirm penalty after post-race inspection

Post-race, following technical inspection at the track, NASCAR confirmed that Zilisch's win was official, with no issues found on the No. 88 during their checks.

However, the same could not be said for one of Zilisch's rivals, Jesse Love. Like Zilisch, Love has qualified for the 2025 Xfinity Series playoffs, but he and his team are now set to be hit with a penalty after it was confirmed that the No. 2 Chevrolet was found to have had one lug nut not safe and secure.

NASCAR has confirmed that this will result in a monetary punishment when the official mid-week penalty report drops.

Slam dunk penalty

The exact amount that Richard Childress Racing is fined will be revealed when this weekend's penalty report drops. However, if we look at previous penalties for this type of infringement, we can get a good idea of the sort of sum they are going to have to cough up.

Several punishments have already been issued this season for similar infringements. Back in March, two of Joe Gibbs Racing's Xfinity Series cars were fined $5000 each for lug nut infractions at Phoenix Raceway under Sections 8.8.10.4a of the NASCAR Rule Book.

Under the same sections of the rule book, later that month, four Xfinity Series teams were hit with penalties following post-race inspection at Homestead-Miami Speedway. On that occasion, once again, each team in question was hit with a $5000 fine.

The most recent punishment for such an infringement came last month at Iowa, with Joe Gibbs Racing once again the culprits.

On that occasion, it was the No. 54 of Taylor Gray that had been found to have one lug nut unsecured.

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