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Why did NASCAR ban Jeff Gordon’s ‘T-Rex car’ despite it being completely legal?

Originally posted on FirstSportz | By Justin P Joy | Last updated 12/23/23

Jeff Gordon, the four-time NASCAR champion was one of the best racers in the world at his peak, and his dominating runs in the NASCAR Cup series had limited parallels. The sanctioning body had to intervene multiple times to keep racing fair since Gordon and his Hendrick Motorsports team were a little too dominant for the sport.

One such moment of NASCAR intervening came in 1997. At that year’s All-Star race, the No:24 Hendrick Motorsports crew came with a car with a unique setup that just dominated the race like nothing before. The car was given the name T-Rex, as it used a color theme promoting The Lost World: Jurassic Park movie.

The car passed NASCAR’s initial inspection with flying colours and in the post-race inspection as well the parts were found legal. NASCAR found themselves in a situation where if Gordon was allowed to run the car for the remaining races, it would be a disaster in terms of an entertainment perspective.

Hence NASCAR made the tough choice. They straight up banned the car sitting fare racing concerns. The HMS team was forced to make a ton of changes to the car to comply with the new mandate and because of that, they were never able to repeat a similar domination that season.

Even if It wasn’t for Jeff Gordon the car would’ve been legal

Ray Evernham, the then-crew chief of Jeff Gordon pointed out that if it wasn’t Gordon, the car would’ve been legal. He pointed out Gordon made the difference and smoked his rivals, as other drivers wouldn’t have made such a big gap.

If it wasn’t for Jeff Gordon driving that car, it might still be legal. It was just a really well-built race car that Jeff Gordon decided to put his foot to the floor at the height of his career and just smoked those guys.

Gordon had a dominant 1997 season that saw him win ten races including the Daytona 500 to secure the Cup title that season. In the 32-race season, Gordon was so consistent, that he finished inside the Top-5 in all the race other seven events.