NASCAR Changes Rules for 2023 Season, Wall-Rides Are Banned for Good

The 2022 season of the NASCAR Cup Series was the first with the Next-Gen Cup Car, which brought new problems and opportunities along with it. Drivers no longer had access to the possibility of unique gear ratios at every track if the team decided something like that. Instead, they had five forward gears in a sequential transmission by Xtrac instead of the old four-speed manuals.

Last year's NASCAR Cup Cars also came with bigger wheels, bigger brakes (15-inch front, 14-inch rear), better suspension than ever, trick underbody aerodynamics, Carbon Fiber Reinforced Plastic (CFRP) body panels, symmetrical bodies, and a common cockpit design with bolt-on front and rear subframes.

While they are meant to look like real vehicles made by the manufacturers that they are representing, each is a full-on race car underneath the shell, and it is a tube-frame effort that is meant to be safer than ever.

With safer cars, one might be inclined to think drivers get an extra bit of confidence, if you will, which comes in the form of increased chances of walking away unscathed from the worst crashes imagined in the sport. There are no guarantees, of course, and motorsport remains dangerous. Incredibly dangerous from multiple perspectives, and it will continue to be so even with all the possible risk mitigation solutions.

The main idea here is to have racing cars with technology that is close to or comparable to what can be had on the street in a production car. An independent rear suspension, larger wheels, and fuel-injected motors (these came years ago, but still after decades of exclusive use of carburetors).

The wheels no longer have five lug nuts, but just a central one—just like other race cars in other series, while the steering system was changed to a rack-and-pinion setup instead of the old steering box. In that field, both technologies have already been replaced by electric power steering systems, but NASCAR had to keep a few things their way.

Now, what you need to know about the rules is that NASCAR has changed penalties for crew chiefs from four-race suspensions to a two-race suspension, and two crew members get suspended if a car loses a wheel beyond pit road.

Road courses will no longer have stage breaks, and teams get an extra minute (seven in total) on pit road to work on their cars if they have been damaged in a collision. The new Cup Cars have easy-to-replace panels, so it makes sense unless there is extreme damage.

Mufflers need to be deployed in the Clash to reduce engine noise at stadiums not designed for motorsports. Cars will have a new kind of recording system to get more powerful crash data in the event of an accident, which has not been upgraded from the tech used twenty years ago.

All drivers will have to wear fire-retardant underclothing from the neck to their wrists, which most did anyway, but now it is mandatory in the series and not just a recommendation. Several drivers will wear mouthpiece sensors to get data directly from drivers in the event of a crash.

The 2023 NASCAR season will have eight locations that will have wet-weather packages: the Coliseum, Lucas Oil Raceway in Indianapolis, Martinsville, Milwaukee, New Hampshire, North Wilkesboro for the All-Star Race, Richmond, and Phoenix.

Since there are rain packages deployed, all drivers and teams will have to have rear lights, as well as windshield wiper hookups, on top of the rain tires, for the events held at the Clash, Martinsville, the races in Phoenix, Richmond, North Wilkesboro, and New Hampshire.

In the case of Chastain's maneuver, the series' officials have decided to check the rules at the end of the 2022 season and then determine if the maneuver should be banned. The "wall ride," which was called "Hail Melon," was clarified this week to be a maneuver that will be penalized if anyone tries it in 2023.

While it brought exciting racing, as well as incredible footage, the rule book states, at 10.5.2.6. A that "any violations deemed to compromise the safety of an event or otherwise pose a dangerous risk to the safety of the competitors, officials, spectators, or others are treated with the highest degree of seriousness."

While the same rule could have been used ever since the playoffs were concluded, the decision was meant to specifically warn competitors against trying it again.

The vice president of competition at NASCAR, Elon Sawyer, explained that there is "no need for new language in the rule book, as the matter was already covered by existing rules, but drivers and teams have now been warned of the consequences." To us, the matter looks like acase of "fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me," and we have seen it happen in motorsport before, but in different forms.

Chastain's move has been recognized for the level of excitement it brought to the sport, as well as the exposure, but that all fades away when you consider that it was an incredibly risky move that may have ended the race not just for that driver, but for many others, and it could have ended with injury or even death if things went haywire, not just material loss.

Just like any sport that involves driving at speeds that go past twice as you are allowed to drive on the highway in any country in the world, nobody wants surprises at that kind of speed and getting into a wreck because someone tried something that might or might not work is not fun or fair for those involved in the racing part.

All the racers on the field in the NASCAR Cup were not happy with the move, even if it worked, as it was not in the spirit of fair competition, and it was dangerous. That last bit is worse than the part with the spirit of competition, as both competitors and teams will try anything that is not specifically banned in the rule book if it might bring them a competitive edge (see Formula 1).

Keeping things in the spirit of the sport and not risking anyone's life any further than racing at close to 186 mph (300 kph) in a car that is hot and loud as you are driving close to a wall. Again, the move was a lucky one-off, which could have ended badly, and we have since learned what started it all.

I admit to having watched it several times in a row since that moment, and it takes a level of skill and luck to pull it off successfully, so it is for the best that it will not happen again. Sure, you might say that rubbing's racing, but this is intentionally crashing into a wall as if you are trying to pull off a sick move while shooting pool.

Ross Chastain had admitted he had initially made that move in the NASCAR 2005 game on Nintendo GameCube when racing against his brother when he was just eight years old. As a fun fact, Chastain admitted that even he disliked the move while doing it, as it was not pleasant.

Today, a move like that will get you banned or penalized in various online racing games, so naturally, it has repercussions in the real world. Cool story, though, that is for sure. Nobody can take that from Chastain, and now let us watch it again.

THE MOVE THAT SENDS ROSS CHASTAIN TO THE #CHAMPIONSHIP4! pic.twitter.com/67Ku712XZf

— NASCAR (@NASCAR) October 30, 2022