NASCAR penalizes Austin Hill for incident with Cole Custer
CONCORD, N.C. — NASCAR penalized Austin Hill for an incident with Cole Custer during the Xfinity Series race Saturday at Charlotte Motor Speedway.
Hill will lose 25 driver points and pay a $25,000 fine for the incident.
On lap 184 of 200, Custer and Hill made contact exiting turn four. That appeared to cut Hill’s right front tire, as Hill went almost straight into Custer in turn one. That sent both of them into the outside wall.
After the crash, Hill spun Custer into the inside wall, further damaging Custer’s car and knocking him out of the race.
“I don’t understand, dude, he doored me down the frontstretch and cut my right front tire down,” Hill said over the radio after the wreck.
The 25-point penalty will drop the Richard Childress Racing driver from the regular season points lead by four points to third in points, now 21 points behind new points leader Chandler Smith.
The penalty could have championship implications. Finishing the regular season in the points lead nets a driver 15 playoff points, compared to eight for finishing third in the regular-season standings.
Luckily for Hill, the playoffs are still 14 races away.
Hill’s No. 21 RCR team still remains in the regular-season owner points lead by four points over the No. 81 Joe Gibbs Racing team.
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Jonathan Fjeld View All
Jonathan Fjeld is the co-owner of the The Racing Experts, LLC. He has been with TRE since 2010.
A Twin Valley, MN, native, Fjeld became a motorsports fan at just three years old (first race was the 2002 Pennsylvania 500). He worked as a contributor and writer for TRE from 2010-18. Since then, he has stepped up and covered 24 NASCAR race weekends and taken on a larger role with TRE. He became the co-owner and managing editor in 2023 and has guided the site to massive growth in that time.
Fjeld has covered a wide array of stories and moments over the years, including Kevin Harvick's final Cup Series season, the first NASCAR national series disqualification in over 50 years, Shane van Gisbergen's stunning win in Chicago and the first Cup Series race at Road America in 66 years – as well as up-and-coming drivers' stories and stories from inside the sport, like the tech it takes for Hendrick Motorsports to remain a top-tier team.
Currently, he resides in Albuquerque, N.M., where he works for KOB 4, an NBC station. He works as a digital producer and does on-air reports. He loves spending time with friends and family, playing and listening to music, exploring new places, being outdoors, reading books and writing among other activities. You can email him at fjeldjonathan@gmail.com