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Former NASCAR Cup Series driver and son of Richard Petty, Kyle Petty, has recently made his feelings known about the current generation of drivers and their lack of respect on the track. In a candid conversation with Kevin Harvick, Kyle opened up about the current state of driver camaraderie and compared it to the earlier generations.
Harvick questioned the former racer about how driver relations have changed through the years. Kyle admitted that while drivers were not close to their competitors earlier, they had a lot of respect for each other. With the commercialization of the sport and the multiple avenues racers can enter NASCAR, they (racers) can be less careful about the consequences of their actions.
He explained the change in driver mentality, talking on the Kevin Harvick's Happy Hour podcast:
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"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 said (30:16 onwards).
He drew a comparison with the past when the likelihood of fatalities and a lack of resources led racers to drive responsibly. However, the scenario has changed, and the change has come about because of the abundance of resources in the sport today.
He also emphasized that the owners throw their weight behind the drivers as the financial stakes in stock car racing have reached their peak:
"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. 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." (29:37 onwards)
Today, teams have multiple partners and cars designed for specific tracks. The charter system also guarantees race entries for teams, creating fiscal stability. Each vehicle, therefore, arguably becomes less and less important, leading drivers to push for the win, causing further accidents.
Kyle Petty reminds NASCAR fans how things were different in earlier generations
Petty grew up watching his grandfather, Lee Petty, and his contemporaries like Buck Baker and Junior Johnson and, later on, his father, Richard Petty, and his peers. He acknowledged how racing was back then.
"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. You ran the same car at Martinsville, you ran at Daytona. You just had one car. That's what - you would thrash that thing everywhere," Kyle added (26:45 onwards).
The veteran racer drove for close to three decades, from 1979 to 2008. He has seen all the changes NASCAR has gone through, from the Generation 1 cars in the '60s to the Gen 7 cars in 2025. While driver relations have improved drastically from his father's time, he believes driving has become more reckless.
He concluded by talking about how social media and fan perception have irked the drivers into believing that careless driving is celebrated.
"People think it's okay to dive into the last corner and take somebody out. People think it's okay to make it six-wide where it should be two-wide. And they think the fans love it, but it's not okay. Fans may love it, and that's okay. I am a firm believer that fans don't know what they like. They just like what they see on one given day," he added (33:01 onwards).
The 2025 NASCAR Cup Series has seen multi-car wrecks in most races so far, and a few experts have argued that the governing body has been inconsistent in penalizing racers. Harvick had earlier exposed major drawbacks in NASCAR's decision-making process.
