June 9, 2010
By Chuck Abrams
Joey Logano stepped out of the shadow of his pest father as well as the former driver of the 20 (Tony Stewart) car and made a statement about his racing at Pocono on Sunday.
In what was a relatively calm, boring race (unless you were listening to MRN) things happened quickly near the end to shake up an otherwise typical Pocono race.
Harvick and Logano were running up front and they tangled in what was a racing incident, but one that was easily avoidable. Whether Harvick was too aggressive or Logano cut down a little (probably a little of both) depends on whose ax is being gored. But in my opinion, Harvick was the one that should have yielded a bit. Harvick was not THAT much faster and was coming up on Logano’s quarter panel, in a turn. It was pretty obvious that Logano would cut lower to make the corner. Harvick gave him no room, stayed in the gas and spun out what was going to be a top 5 run for the 20 team.
Harvick later claimed that Logano needs to learn how to show respect.
Is this coming from the same guy who would drive over his own mother to take a position?
After the race, Logano drove right up to Harvick’s car, which was surrounded by several 220+ lb. linemen who were impersonating Harvick’s crew. Logano’s father Tom got himself another 15 minutes of unneeded fame by egging Joey on. Logano stood up for himself in a way we have never seen before from The Kid.
Much to his frustration, the 'Harvick Wall' was not having any of this and kept Logano away from Harvick. There was no jumping over a vehicle and grabbing your competitor by the lapels and going nose to nose as Harvick is want to do.
To top it all off, the best line of the year was Logano taking a shot at Harvick’s manhood by saying that Delana Harvick wears the firesuit in the family, so it was probably not Happy’s fault.
DOH!
Man oh man, what a riot!
Suffice it to say that Joey L has stepped out of the shadow of Smoke in the 20 car and has now taken a stand over what he thinks is right with some of the veterans of NASCAR –- many of whom expect others to yield to them on the track just because, well, “Don’t they know who I am?”
I sure hope NASCAR let’s the little give and take post race alone. No one deserves any penalties or anything for on the track or off the track behavior. We need these rivalries, especially when we have to sit through 500 miles of triangle racing.
And speaking of rivalries, what does a brother have to do to get a little lovin’?
Point in case A.J. Allmendinger driving teammate Kasey Kahne into the grass and into the pack on the final lap. There was no need to go to that extreme by blocking and it cost a lot of drivers their cars, while nearly causing another horrible wreck -- with Kahne just feet from going over the Pocono wall. Once again, thank goodness for the safety of these cars. But NSACAR and Pocono Raceway ought to take a serious look at something to keep these cars on the track before something nasty happens.
You can be sure the usually quiet, and seemingly timid, Kahne will have some words with Mr. Wallmendinger. Both drivers could have had great team finishes if Wallmendinger had not been driving with his head somewhere up one a bodily orifice.
And for the record, I like the Delana firesuits.
PS – Denny Hamlin won.
Let me know your thoughts.
Drive fast, turn left and keep the shiny side up.
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