“You’re not racing in the Daytona 500 next year!” Joey Logano reveals NASCAR ‘threatened’ drivers about race manipulation at Pheonix

The new Cup champion Joey Logano had made some serious comments about race manipulation after the season finale.

“You’re not racing in the Daytona 500 next year!” Joey Logano reveals NASCAR ‘threatened’ drivers about race manipulation at Pheonix

Joey Logano (Via IMAGO)

Coming into the NASCAR Cup season finale at Phoenix Raceway, one of the biggest concerns they had was race manipulation after the Martinsville drama. The sanctioning body was forced to suspend and fine three driver, Bubba Wallace, Ross Chastain and Austin Dillon, for alleged race manipulation on the final race of the R-8, which determined the championship-4.

So, NASCAR took measures to ensure that the season finale would be clean. The Cup champion Joey Logano, in his recent podcast appearance with ex-Cup winner Kevin Harvick revealed that NASCAR threatened the racers with suspension from the 2025 season opener the Dayton 500, if they are caught of unfairly influencing the race.

The Penske driver is unsure that if it was a real threat from NASCAR as nothing of such gravity hasn’t happened yet. Joey Logano seems to have some serious questions about race manipulation despite the fact the season over and he got the title.

They did threaten us before the race that if anyone manipulates the race somehow, you are not racing in the Daytona 500 next year. Is that a threat? Is that real? We’ll know if something happened. I didn’t see anything happen yesterday (Sunday), but this playoff system is a big piece of it and who do you answer to? That’s the question you have to ask, who do you answer to?

Joey Logano said via Happy Hour podcast.

Joey Logano questions Ross Chastain and Carson Hocevar’s antics at Phoenix

The three-time champion wasn’t impressed with how Chevy drivers Ross Chastain and Carson Hocevar approach the practice runs alongside them during the finale weekend. He pointed out that they were too aggressive with him and Blaney in the practice runs and believes they had some negative intentions with their approach.

Ross Chastain
Ross Chastain (Via IMAGO)

We unload for practice, the 1 is racing the dog crap out of the 12 in practice. The 77 unloads, backs up to me, had a straightaway gap ahead of me, backed up right in front of me and ran right there and just put dirty air. Killed my run in practice. We’re doing this in practice the week after you just got dinged for this. Okay, you see how the weekend’s going to go. They’re not backing off on it, they’re just not going to talk about it.

Joey Logano said.

The comments from Joey Logano raises some huge concerns as if these drivers were plotting some kind of manipulation, it against the spirit of the sport and the sanctioning should not let it happen. It will be interesting to see of NASCAR will take a look into these claims and take action.