Kyle Petty exposes real reason behind young NASCAR racers’ “crash and walk away” attitude
Richard Petty’s son Kyle Petty has the perfect reasoning for the lack of respect while racing among the young generation of drivers.
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Kyle Petty and Richard Petty (Via IMAGO)
One of the major topics of discussions over the years in the NASCAR garage has been the attitude of young racers. Unlike the veterans of the sport, the current generations of the drivers have learned the art of racing more aggressively and many feels the racing etiquette is almost dead in the sport.
Ex-Cup Series racer Kyle Petty shared his thoughts on what Kyle Busch calls the wreck-culture of the young generation in the podcast appearance with the 2014 champion Kevin Harvick. He said via the Happy Hour podcast that the drivers that grew up playing NASCAT video games is approaching real racing the same way.
He pointed out that, these racers grew up racing aggressively, wrecking and walking away. Richard Petty’s son highlighted that these racers don’t have to come to the race shop like the olde generations of drivers to get the car back together. The lack of skin they have in the game result in the lack of respect for the car and make them be more aggressive.
We see drivers now that grow up on video games, that grow up just crashing something and walking away from it. They don’t have to show up on Monday morning at 6:00 and put it back together. They’ve got no skin in the game.
Kyle Petty said via Happy Hour Podcast.
Why don’t owners care about the new racers’ attitude?
Just like the racers, the team owners also aren’t concerned the same level as they used to about their drivers’ crashing cars. Petty believes this happened because the financial reward from racing has grew so big, they can now afford to have specialized operations and helping them to have multiple cars on standby to race.
I think, for owners, it crossed (the line) when the money got so big. When you have a team running 36 races and at one time had 30 cars. We almost got to that, the specialized (operations) – it’s a throwaway.
Kyle Petty said.
He believes the cars no longer have the significance they used to, as the they are just collection of pieces that becomes a racing machine on Sunday. Petty seems to indicate that the lack of emotional connection with the car extend beyond just the driver.
In all reality, cars are not cars. They’re just a collection of pieces that come together on a Sunday to run. Because this rear end might be under this car later.
Kyle Petty added.
Why old generation of racers respected their cars more?
One of the major reason the old generations of racers fought with care and respect on the track, was the fact that they couldn’t afford to wreck their cars. They had just one equipment and had respect for it as they knew that if one wreck happened, it will cost them multiple coming race weeks.
They had a tremendous amount of respect for each other. And they had a tremendous amount of respect for their equipment because they only had one car.
Kyle Petty said.
The comments from the ex-Cup racer seems reasonable and something the NASCAR community needs a hard look into. To help racing etiquette come back, something had to be done to make sure there is an emotional connection between cars and the teams that fields it.
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