NASCAR got it wrong. Plain and simple.
NASCAR Senior Vice President of Competition Elton Sawyer admitted as much during an interview on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio on Tuesday morning and later that evening on NASCAR Race Hub. It was during that latter appearance that the former driver’s words were confusing to say the least.
This conversation with @ClintBowyer on NASCAR Race Hub last night in response to the remarks of NASCAR Senior VP of Competition Elton Sawyer about the restart at Richmond is beyond wild. pic.twitter.com/0bID57DY5N
— Kyle Dalton (@kdsportswriter) April 4, 2024
“Now, I want to be clear if we’re at lap 50 and we officiate the races from lap 1 to lap 400 plus, if we end up in those situations in overtime, we’re going to officiate the race the same way if this happens at lap 40 or 50 or 300, when we have the opportunity with more time to to review it, look at it and be 100 percent accurate and confident that we got, we’re making the right call, then we make the call.”
Clint Bowyer Defends Sawyer and It Doesn’t Help the Situation
A day later, Clint Bowyer made an appearance on The Hub. Naturally, the restart controversy was a discussion point. As were Sawyer’s remarks from the night before, which were replayed.
“Elton is my man,” Bowyer said after watching it. “And listen to me, folks, I don’t think he meant those words. I think he does a good job. He’s a great communicator. The best one we’ve ever had. We are side-by-side with those guys. When we’re in the booth, Kevin, Mike and I, they’re the next window over.
“Those guys do a phenomenal job, a lot going on. This isn’t a baseball-football game where there’s another down, there’s a timeout where you can figure it out and come up with a better scenario. That’s a process. That is an exact process, and it is from the restart number one to the last restart that we have of the race, and it has to be that way.
“You can’t officiate differently on lap five than you do on lap 500. You just can’t. But I don’t feel as if he did. I think he got caught up in a conversation there, and I’m not holding him against it. But he didn’t say it really very good. It didn’t look very good.”
No, it didn’t look good. And neither did his defense of it.