LONG POND, Pa. — For decades, the “let drivers police themselves” idealogy has worked for NASCAR.
When Cale Yarborough and Donnie Allison banged doors, wrecked each other, and threw punches at the end of the 1979 Daytona 500, neither faced fines or penalties.
When Dale Earnhardt Sr. gave Terry Labonte a bump at Bristol Motor Speedway in 1999 to “rattle his cage,” he got served boos from the crowd, but again, no fines or penalties.
Both moments are now considered iconic points in NASCAR history, but if they had occurred in 2024, the aftermath would likely have been very different.
After the All-Star Race in May, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and Kyle Busch brawled in the garage after an on-track incident. Stenhouse, who had time to change from his firesuit into street clothes and think about his impending discussion with Busch, waited for him outside his hauler after the race and threw the first punch that led to chaos with Busch’s team members and Stenhouse’s father.
NASCAR fined the JTG Daugherty Racing driver $75,000 — a move whose severity caught many drivers off-guard.
After Nashville Superspeedway’s race last month, Carson Hocevar was fined $50,000 and lost 25 points after NASCAR reviewed his contact with Harrison Burton, leading to the Wood Brothers Racing driver being spun during a caution period.
Hocevar insisted his contact with Burton was not intentional, citing SMT data in his argument. What did the data show? We don’t know. But NASCAR saw something it didn’t like from Hocevar’s in-car information and punished him accordingly.
Last weekend at the Chicago Street Course, Bubba Wallace intentionally doored race winner Alex Bowman on the cooldown lap, which led to a $50,000 fine, although there was no points deduction.
NASCAR’s hands-off policy regarding on-track incidents and driver fights has been the standard since the sport’s inception. NASCAR even uses clips of crashes and fights in their promotional material.
But times are changing.
Sunday’s incident between Corey LaJoie and Kyle Busch might be the next occurrence that results in disciplinary action from NASCAR. Typically, NASCAR issues penalties on Tuesdays following a race weekend, so it won’t be long until there is a verdict on any potential judgment.
On a restart in the final stage at Pocono Raceway, LaJoie made contact with Busch’s bumper, which caused Busch to spin and collect several cars in Turn 1.
After the wreck, Ryan Sparks, LaJoie’s crew chief, said over his radio: “You let him have it the first time. The second time, he got what he deserved.”
An in-car camera from LaJoie’s No. 7 Chevrolet shows that his nose hit Busch’s rear bumper twice. After the first bump, it sounds like LaJoie stayed on the throttle.
https://x.com/NASCAR/status/1812598142216622234
Sparks’ radio transmission and LaJoie’s apparent failure to lift off the gas are the types of things NASCAR might review when considering a penalty. LaJoie, however, made no indication in his post-race comments that he had any malicious intent.
https://x.com/JohnHaverlin/status/1812616944366817776
“I had a big push from the 16 (AJ Allmendinger), and when you’re 20th back there, you’re in a hornet’s nest seven-wide into (Turn) 1,” LaJoie said. “If you’re not the guy on the bottom, somebody else is going to jam you in there and put you in the middle.
“I had a bit of a run. The 16 gave me a shot; I got to the left rear of the 8 (Busch). He blocked it once, and I kind of held the wheel straight, almost anticipating our bumpers lining up, but when he blocked the second time, he just cut across my nose.”
What LaJoie said and what he was thinking may have been two different things. But history shows that admitting to intentionally crashing someone all but guarantees a punishment from NASCAR, so it’s not surprising he didn’t say anything that could incriminate himself.
If Busch were the only one to crash from this, it’s not as big a deal. However, Harrison Burton, Ryan Preece, and Stenhouse Jr. were innocent bystanders who were also involved in the accident.
LaJoie’s bump with Busch is what race stewards from IndyCar and Formula 1 might deem “avoidable contact,” and LaJoie would have been served a penalty before the race even ended.
NASCAR doesn’t have stewards, but so far, NASCAR hasn’t shown the need for them. It has made judgments on recent incidents and issued penalties, and given Sparks’ comment and LaJoie’s in-car replay, this should be the next affair that requires action from the sanctioning body.
NASCAR’s decision, should it choose to make one against LaJoie, is a ball-and-strikes call. It comes down to what it feels is fair. Although NASCAR has been criticized in the past for inconsistency in its penalty issuing, drivers know they shouldn’t do anything that might be seen as “detrimental to stock car racing,” as the rule book states, because the only certain thing is that what NASCAR says is what goes.
