Over the history of NASCAR, drivers, their crew chiefs, and their teams have tried and succeeded with working in the grey areas of the rule book, finding an advantage, and winning races. It is well understood in NASCAR that teams will do anything to win as long as it isn’t deemed illegal, which in the case of Joey Logano, it finally was. But in the eyes of Kevin Harvick, his former rival and the #22 team deserve some credit.
Advertisement
Logano was found to have been wearing an altered glove on his left hand to gain a performance advantage. Because of this Logano was told to start the race on Sunday from the rear and also serve a pass-through penalty under green. But his worries didn’t stop there as NASCAR further issued a $10,000 fine on the 2x Cup champion for this infringement.
However, Kevin Harvick had a different perspective on this whole incident. He said on his podcast, “I love the innovation part of our sport. I love the creativity.”
“It sucks when you get busted but when you think of things that other people aren’t doing, to me that’s a feather in the cap. I think that’s a feather in those guys’ cap because I heard it was used for multiple years and if that’s the case, kudos to them.”
Denny Hamlin wonders if someone snitched on Joey Logano
Speaking about how NASCAR got to know of Joey Logano wearing an illegal glove, Denny Hamlin claimed somebody told the governing body about the issue. “I’m willing to say there was a whistleblower,” Hamlin said on his podcast recently. “These teams tell on each other for sure.”
Hamlin then explained why NASCAR is called “a self-policing sport” as he said, “When we’re sitting next to each other and watching videos of other cars—the NASCAR Cup Series is full of snitches.”
“I mean, all over the place. They tattle tell.”
The Actions Detrimental host added that when one finds their rival bending a rule or doing something illegal, they tell the tower right away, namely to John Probst, who is the senior vice president of racing innovation, or Elton Sawyer, who is the vice president of competition in NASCAR.
But then again, the fascinating thing in NASCAR is that despite the higher authorities coming down hard on rule violations and such matters, teams continue to push the boundaries of what is legal and what is illegal, anything to gain an advantage, anything to cross the finish line ahead of everyone else.
