Inside The Garage: Where There’s Beef, There’s Fire In Cup Series

Here’s what’s happening this week Inside The Garage: ECHO PARK SPEEDWAY (Hampton, Ga.) — It’s hot in the summer. It’s also hot in the NASCAR Cup Series garage. Drivers are mad at each other. And while that can be good for business, NASCAR is trying to balance its “boys have at it” and “hell yeah” mantras with trying to keep order in the sport. It was just two months ago when there was a great deal of talk at Watkins Glen about the line that drivers can/cannot cross when it comes to retaliation. It became a topic of discussion when Ryan Preece was penalized 25 points and $50,000 for retaliating against Ty Gibbs. When Preece and Gibbs tangled, there didn’t seem to be much animosity between the two drivers, at least outward, toward each other. But now NASCAR has some true beef. Break out the popcorn and watch because it could get ugly. Or maybe not, considering NASCAR brought four drivers in for meetings prior to the on-track activity Saturday at Atlanta. How effective were these NASCAR meetings? Typically, NASCAR does it when it wants drivers to cut it out and behave, that NASCAR doesn’t want it to escalate to a point where a driver gets hurt or other drivers get taken out in the process. NASCAR didn’t penalize Shane van Gisbergen for turning Austin Hill at Chicagoland, and Zane Smith went unpunished after taking a swipe at Carson Hocevar (and wrecking himself in the process). Before qualifying Saturday, NASCAR officials met Hill and van Gisbergen together and then later with Smith and Hocevar. NASCAR employs a “what is said in the hauler stays in the hauler” approach, but in general it is to tell drivers they won’t be getting the benefit of the doubt moving forward. NASCAR officials indicated they didn’t have enough convincing evidence to penalize in either situation. So where do things go from here? Will the meetings be effective for those drivers as well as the entire Cup field? “I can see where it can be mixed messaging, but I just found it interesting that if they didn’t consider an intentional wreck, why are they insisting that it stops?” said driver of the No. 11 car, Denny Hamlin, during his weekend news conference at Atlanta. “If it was an accident, then it would just be organic. “If you are ruling that it’s not intentional but saying it has to stop, then you are saying they had the choice to wreck each other. I got a little confused on that one.” He wasn’t the only one. Brad Keselowski, who like Hamlin is a driver and a team co-owner, told me and other reporters at Atlanta that he was confused that in light of the decision on Preece that others weren’t penalized. “I think we’re all a little confused, but bitter probably not so much,” Keselowski said. “I’ve seen this sport through a different number of different situations. … This sport has always had — and probably always will — have a hard time walking the line of appropriate driver code and ethics, and there’s ebbs and flows. “Certainly, popularity factors into it of what’s acceptable and what’s not. I can’t sit here and say that I have a perfect answer for it, but there are times where it seems a little off … [and] that one felt a little off.” The meetings often are a chance for drivers to talk things out if they want. It didn’t seem like many were too interested. “One person [myself] seemed more remorseful and eager to move on than the other,” van Gisbergen said about his meeting with Hill when talking to reporters a few hours later. “I don’t know how much to say. … I definitely didn’t want to wreck a race car, and I definitely didn’t want to escalate — I don’t really know if it’s rivalry, but whatever it’s been between us the last three years. We never seem to race well together. “So obviously, I don’t want to escalate it. I’m the one with a lot to lose. It was weird dynamic in the meeting and weird way how it ended.” At perilously close to the Chase cutoff, van Gisbergen has a shot to make the postseason while Hill does not. “What’s been cool about the sport, you can kind of sort it out yourselves, and then I guess it gets to that point — and to me, it’s at that point,” van Gisbergen said. “He’s the kind of personality, I guess, who feels like he’s got to get the last laugh or the last one to strike, and he threatened that, I guess. “It is what it is. So I’ll try and race clean and do my own thing. But I guess he’s on his own agenda.” The van Gisbergen-Hill meeting lasted 17 minutes (or at least that was the amount time when they were together in the hauler). Hill said he didn’t know why he and van Gisbergen seem to get in tiffs every few months. “We’re going to go race,” Hill told me and other reporters outside the hauler. “And I’m going to look forward to it. I sure hope [it is over].” The other meeting with Smith and Hocevar featured two drivers who seriously don’t like each other. Or at least one who doesn’t like the other. “I think we both understand like where we’re at with everything, but certainly the meeting doesn’t change how much he dislikes me and how much I dislike him,” Smith told me and other reporters later. “It doesn’t hurt me. It’s kind of funny. … I have no problem with anyone else, and I’m not going to go create the trouble. But I just am a big believer on I’ll race you on how you race me. So until he proves that to me, we’ll go from there.” Smith later said, “I just don’t like him” and doesn’t like his attitude. “He’s pointed me by a few times, and then like Nashville [earlier this year], just as soon as we’re around each other, he just runs into me, and then points me by, and then talks crap to the media,” Smith said. “A goon in my opinion.” Hocevar seemed flabbergasted by it all. He indicated he didn’t know about Smith’s anger with him prior to the incident and didn’t think it was a big deal. “We’ll have to go to couples counseling,” Hocevar quipped to me when asked if he was surprised they have a big rift. “A lot of times with your partner and everything, you don’t see, you don’t see it.” A driver who has seemed to find himself at the center of several incidents and has his aggressive attitude, Hocevar said it would be hypocritical for him to be mad at the incident. “Have you seen me race?” Hocevar said. “I don’t want to be a hypocrite here. Game on.” Hocevar even said he was vocal in the meeting in the hauler. Those traditionally are meetings where drivers are supposed to listen and not be heard. “Dude, I was cracking so many jokes,” Hocevar said. “I partially think that’s the reason they asked me in there. … I got them laughing pretty good.” Trying to laugh or at least make a joke — and possibly earn a profit — on the whole thing was Preece, who is selling shirts that say “Don’t Hit The Button” as a way to indicate not to rant on the in-car radio about other drivers. Preece said at the time Gibbs spun, he was not touching Gibbs and NASCAR’s appellate board indicated that Preece’s rant on the radio was not something they could ignore. “Where’s the line?” Preece asked me and other reporters. “I don’t know where the line is. … The key is, whether it’s racing, whether it’s at work or whether it’s in life, just don’t hit the button.” In The News –The public memorial for Kyle Busch, who died May 21, will be Oct. 9 at Charlotte Motor Speedway following the truck race. It will be open to the public. — On Conor Daly’s “Speed Street” podcast, INDYCAR driver Pato O’Ward said he has asked to be relieved from his Formula 1 reserve and testing responsibilities with McLaren. He says he wants a little more of an offseason, enjoys INDYCAR and wants to focus on his training and the 2027 INDYCAR season. –Chase Elliott will drive in both CARS Tour late model stock and pro late model events this week at North Wilkesboro Speedway as well as the truck race. And all those cars were supposed to be driven by Kyle Busch, who died unexpectedly May 21. Elliott will drive for JR Motorsports in the late models and Spire Motorsports in the truck. Elliott: “I would love to go and get a win in honor of him, his career and the friend he was to me over the years. I don’t know how my name got drawn, asked or what it was, but I appreciate them thinking of me and letting me have that honor to go run those races.” –INDYCAR and iRacing announced that their launch of their first game in decades will come in 2027. It will be released in the weeks leading up to the 2027 Indianapolis 500. It will be available on PlayStation 5, Xbox consoles, and PC via Steam. In The Chase These drivers clinched spots in the Chase in their series after races this past weekend: Cup: Denny Hamlin, Tyler Reddick. O’Reilly: Jesse Love, joining Justin Allgaier. Truck: Layne Riggs, Kaden Honeycutt. Social Spotlight They Said It “What time is it, 3? My baby probably has sh-t in his diaper right now, crying.” — Ryan Blaney following his late-night Cup Series win at Atlanta. In Inside The Garage, Bob Pockrass takes us behind the scenes of the motorsports world the way only he can. Read More

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