France: 'Not going to get too wound up' over Busch-Logano flap

Staff Report

9 years ago

NASCAR Chairman and CEO Brian France said Monday that the sanctioning body is "not going to get too wound up about" Sunday's post-race altercation between Kyle Busch and Joey Logano at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

France's remarks came during an impromptu appearance Monday afternoon on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio's "Tradin' Paint" program.

Last-lap contact between the cars in a contest for fourth place left Busch fuming at Logano after the Kobalt 400 for the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series. Busch's No. 18 Toyota spun toward pit road while Logano drove away from their collision to take the position.

MORE: What Busch, Logano said afteward | Driver reaction

Busch marched toward Logano's No. 22 Ford afterward and took a swipe at his rival, setting off a scrum that involved both crewmembers and NASCAR officials. The two were separated and had harsh words for each other afterward.

Steve O'Donnell, NASCAR Executive Vice President and Chief Racing Development Officer, told SiriusXM on Monday morning that competition officials were inclined "not to react" pending a review of video footage of the altercation. France echoed O'Donnell's feelings, reiterating that the emotions and high stakes that helped spark Sunday's outburst are inherent in stock-car racing.

"Listen, it's an emotional sport as you know," France told SiriusXM. "There's so much on the line for all these drivers and teams. … So much is expected of these guys to do their thing, so when things happen that are going to happen at a race, it's not terribly crazy to understand that emotions are going to blow over sometimes, and we get that."

France spoke out against on-track retaliation, saying that he believed Busch and Logano would work through their differences and that the incident would not carry over from Las Vegas to another venue.

"My guess is that Kyle and Joey will sort that out and there really won't be anything we need to worry about down the road," France said. "If there is, we'll deal with it. We'll look at the tape and look at the crewmember participation and different things, but we also want to be realistic that this is … there is just a lot of emotion and a lot of pressure on these guys to do well and compete at a high level. And when something goes terribly wrong, as it did for Kyle, emotions are going to get the best of all of us at some point or another. Obviously, that's what happened on Sunday."

France also touched on several other pressing topics in his Monday appearance:

On Las Vegas Motor Speedway adding a second Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series event in place of New Hampshire Motor Speedway: "Clearly, Las Vegas is a very accepted NASCAR market, but on balance, we don't like to see any track lose an event. It just has a bad feeling in your stomach when that happens."

On the racing produced by breaking events into three stages in NASCAR's national series: "So whenever we do that, whether it's stage racing or giving greater incentives, then obviously you get a higher performance level. And that's true of any sport, not just us."

On the move to reducing downforce in NASCAR's aerodynamic rules: "I was not a fan originally on the lower-downforce package, but I'm wrong a little bit on that -- or a lot wrong -- because that's proven to be the cars are harder to drive, it's more exciting for sure, and so the net of it is that attendance is up and ratings have been up and we're happy with things, but watching every week to make sure we deliver the best racing in the world."