Photo Credit: Noel Lanier
Three drivers from the NASCAR driver council – Denny Hamlin, Brad Keselowski and Joey Logano – have all spoken to the media about their decision as drivers to contribute to paying the fine that NASCAR issued to Tony Stewart in regards to his comments on the lug nut situation.
While speaking with the media on Wednesday, Stewart was vocal about his opinion in regards to the current lug nut rules that NASCAR has in place. On Thursday, NASCAR announced that they had fined Stewart $35,000 for his comments as they were a violation of Section 12 of the rule book, which details member conduct guidelines. According to Section 12.8.1, actions that could result in a $10,000-$50,000 fine include disparaging the sport and/or NASCAR’s leadership, or verbal abuse of a NASCAR official, media member, fans, etc.
The NASCAR Driver’s Council – Keselowski, Jimmie Johnson, Kyle Busch, Hamlin, Dale Earnhardt Jr., Stewart, Kyle Larson, Kevin Harvick and Logano – released a statement on Thursday night in support of Stewart, saying that they’d paid the fine equally each to send a message of disagreement to the sanctioning body.
Denny Hamlin, driver of the No.11 FedEx Toyota Camry, for Joe Gibbs Racing sent the statement initially to NBC Sports for them to publish. Hamlin ha been hit by a similar fine twice previously for comments that he’s made on a couple of occasions.
“I think it kind of shows a unity amongst us,” Hamlin said. “ It really has nothing to do with lug nuts or no lug nuts or anything like that, it’s more so the drivers believing that they have a right to express their opinion especially when asked in an interview. We try to do our best to give honest answers and sometimes those aren’t always the best thing. I know at times I’ve been very guilty of being too honest at times or too opinionated at times and it costs you a nickel or two.
“We just think that there should be a little bit of leniency there for someone that knows a lot about our sport and has been in our sport a long time. He gave his opinion and especially when it’s something on safety too. I think it’s pretty important. As far as what we believe, it’s all said in the statement. Everything I’m telling you here is my opinion and my opinion only.”
When Stewart told the council about the fine, they talked it over and that is when the decision was made.
“I think it’s more of a council thing,” Hamlin said. “Obviously we chat on a daily basis about issues within our sport or things we’d like to work on or change or stay the same. When Tony (Stewart) informed us of the fine, we didn’t agree with it and no one agreed with it and we thought there was something we should do about it. This was a way for us to send a message back to NASCAR, not that we were trying to send any specific message that we just believe that we should have the right to speak our opinion. I don’t know whether everyone agrees with the opinion he had or not, but it doesn’t matter. It’s what he was asked so he answered the question. I think that was the biggest thing for us. We should have the right to speak our opinion.”
The driver’s council are there to speak for the drivers and to be heard with higher powers in the NASCAR organization, through meetings to discuss their concerns. Some of the concerns may surround safety and competition, while others range to behavioral, such as this topic.
“I think that the driver’s interests and the owner’s interests is 95 percent aligned most of the time,” Hamlin said. “There’s some things that we feel like we would like to see changed, sometimes it doesn’t align with what NASCAR thinks or what the teams think, but I think that this was a pretty black and white thing from a driver’s perspective to have a guy that’s coming back and is in the middle of an interview and gets asked a question and he responds to the question and gets fined for it.
“That to us was a moment and I think for us it just shows solidarity that we’re all in this together as the drivers and we want to have one voice because that one voice is obviously a little louder and clearer to NASCAR when we go into meetings talking about where it’s going to head from competition to safety and amongst other things. I think that its grown a lot over the last year and our communication as drivers, the barriers that we have, those have been broken down tremendously over the last year to two.”
Hamlin says already that their meetings have helped the change the sport, and feel that there will be continued change in the years to come.
“Mostly it’s all positive, every now and then we feel like we should show solidarity to a guy whose done a lot for the sport,” he said. “We still don’t want to be so politically correct all the time and have to filter our thoughts and think about it because we have sponsors on our cars or owners we have to answer to or NASCAR, sometimes you just want to say what you feel and we feel like you should be able to do that at times.”
Hamlin doesn’t know where the line is when it comes to comments from drivers but that there has to be one. He does note, though, that a driver should be able to express themselves and their opinions and as long as they aren’t totally trashing the sport than there should be no penalty.
Brad Keselowski, driver of the No. 2 Miller Lite Ford Fusion, for Team Penske, also addressed the media about the Council’s decision regarding Stewart’s fine, as people are wondering why all of a sudden it is the Driver Council’s responsibility to make comments on the (Tony) Stewart issue.
“I don’t think I have a good answer for that,” Keselowski said. “I think there is some change within the sport, as always, and that is not always a bad thing, and not always a good thing. It is somewhere in between. I think we are all trying to find the future direction of the sport and there are going to be some steps we go forward and steps we go back. I think that is just part of it.”
There are also questions as to whether the council’s decision is a step forward or a step back as they may be blurring the line in making comments on each other’s behalf in relation to the issue.
“I don’t know if anyone has really taken a step forward over the last 48-hours.” Keselowski said. “Yeah, I don’t have an answer for that. I think if I was to answer for that I would be speaking for other people.”
Though one thing for certain, when it came down to it is that the Council’s decision was unanimous between all the drivers in the council.
“I think every driver feels that there is a line to be walked there,” Keselowski said. “This sport can’t survive just on drivers. I am going to tell you that right now. We need race cars, race tracks, promoters and everybody has a role in making this sport happen. I think that is something we should always keep in mind. Whose share of that role is what or how important and how you scale that I think is up for debate. As it pertains to the particular example, I think it is important that as a driver we are allowed to have a voice to communicate but that doesn’t mean that we can say anything we want at any time.”
He hopes that this is taking the sport where it wants to go.
“I think collaboration,” Keselowski said. “I think if we can herd all the cats into the same room and get into an active dialogue, which I think we have made major steps on over the last year or so, certainly not all the steps we want to make but still major steps, and understand that there is going to be a lot of self-interest. Of course I have a great pit crew so I have self-interest and I am not afraid to admit that. I am sure there are a handful of other guys who say they have a great pit crew or new widget that makes their team great on pit road and you don’t want to lose that advantage. Sometimes you wear those glasses where our own interests supersede the interests of the sport. That is tough to get through but in time will work themselves out if everybody collaborates.”
Joey Logano, driver of the Pennzoil Ford Fusion, for Team Penske, spoke to the media as well about the Stewart issue. He thinks that drivers like Stewart should get to have a say in the safety of the cars that they will be driving.
“I think we have all kind of put our opinion out there as a group over last evening,” Logano said. “Whether it is Tony or whoever it is I think a lot of times we want to be able to talk and voice our opinions, especially on the safety front of things. I don’t think it really matters who it is. With Tony there is plenty of experience behind what he says and a lot of people listen to his opinions because he has a lot backing him up.”
Logano also said the Drivers Council will now be more vocal about certain issues that come up.
“I think we have seen some vocal coming out of it already,” Logano said. “There have been a lot of good things the council has done, especially this last year. The goal was for everyone to work together. The goal was to have not just a driver council and the owners and NASCAR and the competition group. All of us are supposed to work together to grow the sport into something even larger than it is right now. That is the ultimate goal for the council.”
Separate from the penalty, the drivers are happy that Stewart is back in the car this weekend at Richmond International Raceway and that he is well enough to get back to racing.
“It’s good,” Hamlin said. “This is a retirement season for him and it was a little bit delayed, but he’s now going to be going to some of these race tracks for eth final time and I know just in general Tony has been around and traveling each week to the race tracks and been very hands on with his race team. It doesn’t match being able to go out there and race with him. I know it’s all special memories for us to be able to go out there and compete with him. I know me coming into the Cup Series and being a teammate of his in my rookie season was awesome, but our relationship has grown so much further now that we’re not teammates. It’s a great season — would love to see him make a Chase push if he can and end on a good note.”
The series has yet to comment on the council’s decision but Hamlin is sure that soon they will.
