NASCAR docks Austin Cindric 50 points for crashing Ty Dillon at COTA

Austin Cindric’s retaliation against Ty Dillon resulted in a points penalty.

NASCAR announced Wednesday that the Team Penske driver had been penalized 50 points and fined $50,000 after he turned Dillon on the front stretch in the opening laps of last weekend’s race at Circuit of the Americas.

Cindric hooked Dillon after Dillon pushed him off the track in the final corner. As Cindric got back on the track, he moved over to spin Dillon to the outside wall. Does Cindric get penalized if he spins Dillon while trying to return to the track instead of seconds later? It’s an interesting thought exercise.

While you can debate if Dillon's move was fair or not — and given how early in the 95-lap race it was, there's a strong case that it was way over the line — it's clear to NASCAR that Cindric's move was worthy of a reprimand even if his frustration was justified.

Cindric could have been subject to a suspension, but the slower speed of the crash and the lack of a resulting caution played a role in the penalty. NASCAR has said it wants to crack down on drivers intentionally crashing others; Chase Chase Elliott was suspended for a race when he hooked Denny Hamlin into the wall on the frontstretch at Charlotte in 2023.

Had Cindric been suspended, his suspension would have come with a tougher consequence than Elliott's did. Ahead of the 2025 season, NASCAR said that any driver who misses a race for a suspension or a non-injury reason would retain playoff eligibility but wouldn’t be able to keep any playoff points earned during the regular season.

That would have left Cindric with the minimum number of starting points in the playoffs if he qualified. Now, he simply faces a regular-season points penalty. He was 11th and 36 points back of the points lead before the penalty. Now he's 34th in the points standings with 30 points.