NASCAR champ Joey Logano blames funding model for rise in aggressive young drivers

Joey Logano recently shared his thoughts on aggressive driving during last weekend's Xfinity Series race at Martinsville Speedway. The defending NASCAR Cup Series champion said the real problem is the lack of consequences.

Saturday's Marine Corps 250, had a ton of crashes and caution laps (102 in total). However, the final lap was the most chaotic. Sammy Smith tried to wreck Taylor Gray, who was leading, to take the win but ended up spinning both of them out. Austin Hill took the opportunity to slip past and won the race.

During a recent interview with Trenton Worsham, Logano expressed his opinion on what caused the reckless behavior. He pointed out that most drivers bring their own sponsorship money to teams, which makes it harder to hold them accountable.

"It's different when you're paying to drive the car. You are now the boss, right? Like, when you were getting paid to drive the car, you have a boss. When you're the one bringing the money, you can't fire you, right? Like, it's going to take a lot more to do that," Joey Logano said (01:40 onwards).

"So I would say, you know, that's probably the number one biggest thing. It's just, where's the money coming from, and who's going to hold them accountable?" he added.

Joey Logano further mentioned how racing has changed and that young drivers used to work on their cars with their dads. Now, the drivers have teams doing everything for them and this lets them skip the responsibility, according to him.

"It used to just be you and your dad, and when you tore it up, you were fixing it, you know? And, like, there was a little different approach from that standpoint. I think that's some of it," Logano said (01:16).

NASCAR did later punish Smith with a $25,000 fine and docked him 50 points in the Xfinity standings. The sanctioning body penalized other drivers and has also called a mandatory meeting of all Xfinity drivers before this week's race at Darlington Raceway.

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Where did Joey Logano qualify for upcoming NASCAR Cup race at Darlington?

Joey Logano is currently in his 17th full-time season in the NASCAR Cup Series. He has earned three titles in the series with 36 wins over 579 starts. The Team Penske driver currently ranked ninth in the points standings with one top-10 finish. He had his best finish of the year last week at Martinsville Speedway, in eighth place.

Logano qualified in 18th place for the upcoming race, the Good Year 400 at Darlington Raceway, with a lap of 29.04 seconds. He has three top-10 finishes at the 1.366-mile oval in his last six starts. Logano also has a win at the track, which came in the spring of 2022.

The eighth race of the 2025 NASCAR Cup Series season is scheduled to start at 3:30 pm ET on March 6.