Last week’s NASCAR Cup race at Atlanta would be remembered for its photo finish duel at the finish line. Daniel Suarez won the race with a 0.003 gap ahead of Ryan Blaney. However, the weekend also saw a conspiracy regarding Joey Logano’s illegal gloves. Now, NASCAR Hall of Famer Dale Earnhardt Jr. has commented on the issue.
Logano had qualified second for the race in Atlanta but was later penalized for violating the SFI specification. Initially, the 33-year-old was excluded as he modified his gloves to deflect air from the window. Subsequently, many reputed figures from the series commented on the issue, the most prominent being Earnhardt.
He’s got this glove, [and] they filled the fingers with a web material so when he sticks his hand out the window in front of the window net, it’s knocking air off the rear spoiler... 'what if we did something to the gloves and made it even better.’ Maybe Joey had this idea who knows. Dale Earnhardt Jr. said on his Dirty Mo Media podcast(H&T:on3.com).
The 49-year-old reckons the young starlet might have suggested to his team to gain a competitive advantage. Later, this had repercussions for the American driver, and Earnhardt explained that no one had ever employed such tactics before and that it was against the spirit of the sport.
How did other drivers react to Joey Logan’s penalty?
Logano had increased the webbing between his thumb and index finger to prevent the air from entering the car through the window. This caused a fine to be issued against him of $10,000 by the SFI. Following this, Xfinity Series driver Parker Kligerman has shared his opinion on Logano’s penalty.
It’s funny, since I’ve been in NASCAR there have always been these little tricks at superspeedways. In trucks, we try to pull the window net as far forward as possible, drivers will wear black gloves so as they come down the backstretch on the out lap they can try and pull it forward to block the air entering off the A-post. Similar to what Joey Logano was trying to do. Parker Kligerman said.
The 33-year-old explained that there have been numerous instances in the series to gain an advantage over the others, by multiple drivers. Kligerman stated that such tactics are used earlier to block off the air from entering the car and decrease the drag on the straights.
However, Logno would have learned his lesson in Atlanta and wouldn’t be repeating any such trickery for the time being. The Penske driver now gets ready for the race in the Sin City this Sunday and would be hoping to perform a lot better than his previous outing.
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