"It was very much a safety concern" - NASCAR insider gives his take on Joey Logano's action near RCR crew
Jordan Bianchi recently opened up about Joey Logano's post-race incident where he tried out a mini burnout in the pit road.
As per Bianchi, Logano with his #22 Ford Mustang was very close to the Richard Childress Racing crew. Bianchi added that Logano almost triggered a safety concern for NASCAR.
Logano was visibly furious after his overtime loss to Austin Dillon on Sunday at Richmond. Dillion rammed Logano from behind and sent him spinning, which cost him the victory.
Having lost the race despite leading in the penultimate lap in overtime, Joey Logano entered the pit road with an air of disappointment. His post-race interview about Dillon was enough to tell the story.
However, his pit road incident was what grabbed Bianchi's attention.
Bianchi and Jeff Gluck recently talked about the Cook Out 400 at Richmond Raceway. The duo discussed everything about the race, especially Dillon's controversial finish and the aftermath involving Logano.
"Logano pulls up, not too far down pit road, but close enough and you're like oh man he's like close enough where he's going to get out of the race car and this is who knows what's gonna happen here right? But quickly NASCAR got on Logano like an official was on him in a heartbeat and quickly admonished him for the little mini burnout," Bianchi said in Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s Dirty Mo Media. (5:02-5:22)
Bianchi then asserted that Logano's pit road behavior was a "safety concern."
"It was very much a safety concern as in like you did this little mini burnout with people all over pit road, kind of basically in front of the #3 team. Like it was you know [it] was kind of one of those things, that's what he [NASCAR official] was saying like you can't do that," he said. (6:23-6:34)
Dillon's actions with Logano and Denny Hamlin triggered massive criticism of NASCAR. The #11 driver even questioned NASCAR's authority given that they allowed the RCR driver to keep his victory despite the last-lap incident.
NASCAR responds to Joey Logano's post-race incident
NASCAR noted Joey Logano's activity in the pit road after he aggressively arrived to park his car. The Team Penske driver was understandably upset, but his mini burnout reportedly broke NASCAR's safety protocol.
Addressing this, Elton Sawyer, NASCAR's Vice President of Competitions, revealed his thoughts. He said in the post-race interview:
"Yeah, we'll take, you know, we don't want to make a split-second decision and get it wrong. So we want to make sure we go back and we'll look at everything that happened on the last lap and post-race and see if any penalties need to be issued."
Interestingly, Denny Hamlin also stopped for a while in front of the Richard Childress Racing garage and showed his frustration. However, it was deemed not as dangerous as Logano's.