NASCAR announced Tuesday that Cory Roper has been reinstated and may return to action. He was indefinitely suspended by NASCAR in February for violating the sanctioning body’s substance abuse policy.
What specifically resulted in Roper’s suspension was never publicly revealed, but substance abuse infractions are dealt with by undergoing NASCAR’s Road to Recovery programme. Rules on substance use are outlined in Section 4.1 of the rulebook while Section 10.1.A on “general procedure” can also be cited.
Roper raced for his family team Roper Racing between 2018 and 2021, scoring three top tens with his most notable being a third at Daytona in 2021 after losing out in a photo finish. The other two came at Texas (ninth in 2019) and Talladega (sixth in 2021).
He did not run a race in 2022, having originally planned to enter Talladega but withdrew due to weather concerns. In the meantime, he focused on being team manager as the outfit signed Kaden Honeycutt to run the first six races of 2023. After failing to qualify at Daytona, Honeycutt finished twenty-fifth at Las Vegas and thirty-third at Atlanta, the latter coming after a piece of metal punctured his radiator and spoiled a day in which he led his first career lap. Like Roper, Honeycutt hails from Texas; coincidentally, Roper’s reinstatement comes on the same week that the #04 team races at the Texas-based Circuit of the Americas.
Cup Series driver Chase Briscoe has also raced for the team, scoring a fifth at Bristol in 2021.
Roper’s reinstatement comes on the same day that a peer received the opposite, with Josh Williams getting a one-race suspension in the Xfinity Series.
