Bubba Wallace was fined $50,000 by NASCAR on Wednesday for an on-track infraction following Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race at the Chicago Street Course.
He was fined for driving Alex Bowman into the wall during the cool-down lap. The post-race issue came on the heels of a Lap 25 incident in which Bowman’s Hendrick Motorsports No. 48 Chevy became tangled with Wallace’s No. 23 23XI Racing Toyota.
NASCAR said Wallace violated Sections 4.4 B & D of its member code of conduct.
Bowman won the storm-shortened race to clinch a spot in the NASCAR playoffs. He also accepted blame for the incident on Lap 25 and said Wallace should not be fined for the latter exchange.
“I’d be mad, too,” Bowman said of Wallace. “I ruined his day. The restart was chaotic. I just made every wrong decision that I possibly could. I was fighting with my windshield wiper switch trying to get it working and I couldn’t get it working. I was focused on that, missed the corner.
“I locked all four tires and just slid right into him. I just messed up and absolutely ruined his day.
“I’m pretty hard on myself when I make mistakes like that and I’ve been embarrassed about it since it happened. The rain delay was a lot of me just sitting there being embarrassed and being mad at myself.
“He has every right to be mad.”
Wallace finished in 13th place and resides one spot outside of the 16-driver playoff field.
–Field Level Media
