NASCAR to reconsider how practice penalties are handled

Logano sits in the penalty box with his dunce cap on

A NASCAR executive said Monday "it's fair for us to take a look" at the rule that forced Joey Logano to sit on pit road for an entire 50-minute practice session after his #22 Ford failed pre-qualifying inspection four times the day before.

The rule was addressed by Steve O'Donnell, NASCAR's chief racing development officer, on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio's "The Morning Drive."

O'Donnell said the punishment was under the spotlight because no team had been handed a penalty for an entire practice session.

"So this was the first time we've ever had an entire practice (sat out)," O'Donnell said. "The reason the drivers are part of that is to have some teeth in the penalty. If the driver's not part of that, we felt like teams may purposefully just continue to fail because it's an entire team penalty and needed everybody to be part of that. We've done that many times this year and really hasn't been a story because it hasn't been the entire practice."

"I think there's some different things we could look at in the future, maybe not for this year because we want to be fair to the rule that we've had in place," O'Donnell said. "In 2018 you could look at the possibility of a driver going out to start practice and then being pulled off the track or black flagged if it's a 20-minute penalty or whatever that may be and go that route. One of those things that until it happens in a totality of practice, it becomes more of a story and something to look at. I think it's fair for us to take a look at that going forward." NBC Sports