The drama between Chase Briscoe and Erik Jones, stemming from NASCAR’s trip to Phoenix over the weekend, continues to boil into this week’s preparation.
Following the race in the desert, Jones made comments about Briscoe having an “issue” with him seemingly every week. He then said he was going to call the Stewart-Haas driver, but didn’t expect a phone call in return.
Ever since hearing Jones’ comments, Briscoe has been dumbfounded, wondering what he did to irk the Legacy Motor Club wheelman. Speaking with SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, Briscoe revealed that Jones still hasn’t reached out, and the Stewart-Haas racer remains just as confused.
“I haven’t got a phone call or anything yet. I don’t really know still, what he’s super mad about, to be honest with you,” Briscoe stated. “I know that we were four-wide at one point, and I know I got barely into him off of turn four, and then a couple laps later is when Bubba [Wallace] hit him. Same thing, we were four-wide. Bubba kinda hit me in the door, slid up and hit Erik.
“It was one of those deals where we were four-wide into one, and we all just kind of ran out of room. But I think that’s what he’s mad about, I think.”
Regardless, Briscoe has tried to make sense of the situation, but still can’t find what he did wrong, even after numerous attempts to watch the replay of the race, and the incident he believes Jones is referring to.
“I don’t know if he just hasn’t called me because he watched the replay and realized it wasn’t really me that did it. But I haven’t heard from him,” Briscoe added. “If he calls me, I’d be glad to talk to him, and really kind of explain everything to him. But yeah, I haven’t heard from him yet.
“I’m out there racing. When I went and watched the replay, I was obviously concerned about it, when I heard his comments. When I watched it, I didn’t feel like it was anything that bad. I thought it was just a racing deal, where four guys were all kind of going for the same spot, and it all just kind of closed up.”
If there’s an issue between Chase Briscoe and Erik Jones, we’ll certainly find out this weekend at Bristol. There’s no better place to settle your differences, and that might be exactly what these two talented drivers need. We’ll be keeping a close eye on the action when they’re near each other.
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