This past week the Lucas Oil Late Model Series kicked off their 2021 season with their traditional races at East Bay Raceway Park during the Winter Nationals. Like usual just about all the big names were in attendance and like usual drama was in attendance as well. While the racing was fierce and intense but the headline and head turner wasn't the winners or the excellent racing. No, rather it would be the controversial decision to disqualify Tyler Erb and his post race antics with Mason Zeigler.
Now, reading through a ton of comments and articles coming from this event and prior races a couple common phrases keep popping up. First there's the old fashioned line of, "It's just a racing situation." Then there's this go to, "It's just hard racing." Now both of these are often followed with some other insult along the lines of getting over it or change sports. However, it is always to justify how this is acceptable.
But is "hard racing" acceptable or is it just being tolerated so that another time the driver can return the favor? This was proven later the same night that Tyler Erb was disqualified, when Chase Junghans intentionally wrecked Mason Zeigler for racing him dirty at the end of 2020. Junghans went as far as confirming that it was intentional and that he didn't give a *****. One driver when questioned about the situation mentioned that these types of situations and this style of driving wasn't tolerated years ago and if drivers had drove like any of the priorly mentioned, that they would be taken care of in the pits with a punch or two.
Yet, in today's softer society, fights are frowned upon and are often punished with suspensions, fines, or banishments. Which leads to drivers taking their frustration out on the track and using their race cars to settle the score. It's situation which leads to angry pit crews, mad drivers, and junked cars and the last thing we need right now are junked cars. Often times the individual's who are hardest impacted are the innocent bystanders (drivers) who get caught up in the "hard racing" and get junked.
Now don't get me wrong, hard racing leads to good storylines which can lead to butts in the seats for tracks. However, it's just intriguing how we often try to justify "hard racing" and yet when it happens to our driver, it all of sudden becomes unacceptable. Has the racing community become hypocritical or is it a sign that we should stop this tolerance of "hard racing"?
So what's worse? Rough driving being taken care of in the pits or rough driving being taken care of on the track? We want to hear from you! So leave a message on the facebook page or below!
Comments