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Chase Elliott’s crew chief on NASCAR officials’ message about feud with Kevin Harvick: ‘They’ve had enough’

While some people are digging the NASCAR drama on track between Chase Elliott and Kevin Harvick, the sport’s officials are over it and have threatened “serious consequences” if the feud continues, the Associated Press reported.

The two drivers got into it during the Bristol Motor Speedway playoff race in September, both on the track and then with multiple tense conversations afterward before lobbing insults at each other through the media. Then things escalated Sunday at Charlotte Motor Speedway’s Roval race when Harvick punted Elliott’s No. 9 Chevrolet in the middle of the race, sending Elliott into the wall and causing serious damage to the car.

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Harvick was later coy about that move being payback for Elliott impeding the No. 4 Ford at Bristol. After being wrecked during the Roval race, the No. 9 team was heard discussing retaliation against Harvick on the team radio, but Harvick crashed with 10 laps to go before Elliott could get to him.

This ongoing feud between Elliott and Harvick provided an entertaining jolt to the Cup Series playoffs, but NASCAR officials are hoping for a truce. And they talked to both teams Wednesday, per the AP’s Jenna Fryer.

Earlier this week, Scott Miller, NASCAR’s senior vice president of competition, told SiriusXM NASCAR Radio they “don’t want to park anybody,” but they will if they feel it’s necessary.

And then Thursday, Elliott’s crew chief, Alan Gustafson, somewhat cryptically relayed the message NASCAR dealt to the teams.

Gustafson told SiriusXM NASCAR Radio:

“What NASCAR does is they take the stance — and the stance I agree with — is they try to allow the competitors to compete, and the competitors to be the ones who determine the outcome with the races and let the competitors take care of it on their own. And I think that’s the way it should be, right? The story shouldn’t be NASCAR; it should be about the competitors racing and doing the best they can to compete and be the best they can be.

“The message that NASCAR has delivered is they tried to do the best job they could do in allowing it to happen, and they’re over it. So yeah, whatever way you want to look at it from there, but I commend them for allowing us to race, but I think they’ve had enough. So they made that pretty clear.”

When Gustafson was asked about his confidence level going into the playoffs’ Round of 8 – which starts Sunday at Texas Motor Speedway — and if he’s concerned about future incidents with Harvick and the No. 4 team, he said:

“I mean, to be honest with you, I was never worried. There’s nothing I can do. That’s the way I look at it. Like, I can’t control what anybody does on the track besides the 9, so I just focus on the 9. And my focus and the team’s focus has always been, ‘What can we do to be better? What can we do to thrive in any situation?’

“For me, really, consuming over what somebody else could potentially do is just wasting time and taking away from the time that you can put into doing something that could actually benefit your performance. So I can’t control what anybody does, much less Kevin, so hey, I’m not going to waste any time consuming over it. It’s just pointless.”

With just four races left in the 2021 season, NASCAR returns to the track Sunday for the Autotrader EchoPark Automotive 500 at Texas (2 p.m. ET, NBC).

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