It’s likely that William Byron and Corey LaJoie both said the same three words as they climbed from their battered race cars following a massive wreck early in Stage 2 of Saturday night’s NASCAR Cup race at EchoPark Speedway. Those three words? ‘What Just Happened?’
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If both drivers — along with 21 others who were involved in the multi-car wreck — thought they were at Daytona or Talladega, where big wrecks are the norm, it would be understandable.
But this was Atlanta. Still, the 1.54-mile track has become known as a mini Daytona or ‘Dega — now considered a drafting-style track like those others — since its renovation and reconfiguration following the 2021 season.
Well over half the field were involved in numerous wrecks, including one with three laps left in Stage 1, and the early Stage 2 crash that took out both Byron and LaJoie.
“There wasn’t really a whole lot I could see,” Byron said. “I was kind of catching the No. 22 (Joey Logano) with a little bit of a run. All the guys at the front had pitted during the stage break and cycled to the mid-20s.
“We were just running a great race in the top five. They all stacked up and at that point, I went right a little bit; the wreck was already happening and I just kind of got shoved into it.”
As a result, Byron finished a disappointing 37th in the 40-car field. “It’s just a bummer that early in the race,” he added. “I don’t really know what was going on. We were getting up to speed and everyone was throwing a lot of blocks or something, I don’t know.
“It was fun out there, honestly. The first stage was fun. Handling really mattered. I thought my No. 24 Axalta Chevrolet was good. I thought our team was calling a great race and we were doing everything we could do.”
LaJoie: “What in the hell were they doing?”
As for LaJoie, competing in only his fourth race of the season — and his first in over two months — he was right near Byron and also got collected in the pileup, finishing 39th.
“Smoke and then a lot of cracked carbon fiber from my hood being blasted up on my windshield,” LaJoie said when asked what he saw as the crash was happening. “Watching the replay, I don’t know what in the hell (were they) doing pushing like that in the straightaway.”
Even so, LaJoie was a bit conciliatory that this is the kind of thing that happens in pack racing at superspeedways like Daytona, ‘Dega and now the mini-superspeedway at “Hotlanta.”
“It’s not really anybody’s fault, but it’s everybody’s fault because you’ve got three pedals in there and I just don’t know where everybody is trying to go,” LaJoie said.
“These bumpers are rounded, so you push somebody off-square and you’re gonna wreck them. It’s just unfortunate. I don’t know whose fault it was. It was everybody’s fault because we just caused a big wreck.”
