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NASCAR Sprint-Cup Series
JENSEN: Have At It, NASCAR
The ball is now in NASCAR's court...
Tom Jensen  |  Posted March 08, 2010   Charlotte, NC
SPEED.com's Editor-in-Chief Tom Jensen. (Image: SPEED)
Have at it, boys? Oh, Carl Edwards and Brad Keselowski certainly did just that on Sunday, where the two took turns wrecking each other, with Keselowski ending up on his roof in the closing laps of the Kobalt Tools 500.

Now, it's NASCAR's turn to have it.

Sometime between now and roughly 5 p.m. Tuesday, NASCAR will decide what, if any, penalties should be handed out in the wake of Sunday's Boys Gone Wild, Atlanta Edition.

My vote for penalties? Absolutely nothing. No fines, no suspensions, no probation. Just a stern warning to both parties that it's over and the next time either one of you is involved in any nonsense, then the hammer drops, big-time.

But for now: Have at it, boys. See you in Bristol in two weeks. Period.

Judging by some of the responses burning up the Internet and the Twitterverse, clearly not everyone agrees. In fact, many folks vehemently disagree with my analysis.

Several right-thinking people I know have suggested that Edwards be parked for somewhere between one race and the rest of the season, heavily fined and placed on double-secret probation. Those who favor throwing the book at Edwards rightly point out that a 3,450-pound car traveling at 190 miles per hour is a potentially lethal weapon.

True enough.

But take a look at history.

Racers have always fought. They are fiercely competitive people by nature and some of NASCAR's most memorable moments have been caused by its angriest and most intense rivalries.

When one driver crosses the line, the aggrieved party or parties retaliate and the drivers settle it and move on. It happened when the Petty and Allison families feuded bitterly in the 1970s. It happened when Cale Yarborough and Donnie Allison came to blows after the 1979 Daytona 500.

In 1991, the blindingly fast but perpetually reckless Ernie Irvan was confronted by other drivers about the havoc he was causing on the track.

“I see a young man with a driving style that might be good for Saturday night racing, but it just isn't going to fly here in Winston Cup,” said Darrell Waltrip after Irvan triggered a massive pile-up at Pocono in '91. “I don't want to get hurt driving one of these race cars any more than anyone else does, and this looks like the kind of guy that can hurt you.”

Rusty Wallace was even more blunt. “I told him the other day, I said, 'I'll tell you the same thing I told Earnhardt: I said we'll race each other, you hit me and I'm going to crash you. And I've never had any problem with Irvan and I never had any problem with Earnhardt. And if they touch me, I'm going to wipe them out. So if you've got that idea with them, you're not going to have a problem. That's the way it is.”

Eventually, Irvan manned up and apologized to the entire field at Talladega prior to the 1991 Diehard 500. He stood up at the pre-race driver's meeting and apologized. “I've drove a little over-aggresive some,” said Irvan. “I'm going to work on being a little more patient. I want to earn everybody's respect back.”

More recently, in the 2006 Daytona 500, Tony Stewart deliberately drilled Matt Kenseth in the door at 190 mph, sending the 2003 series champion up into the outside wall with a frightening impact. This, after Stewart had earlier said that if NASCAR didn't step in to calm the rough driving, someone was going to get killed at Speedweeks.

Stewart's penalty? He was sent to the end of the longest line during the caution he caused. Stewart even admitted afterwards that he'd wrecked Kenseth on purpose. “He started the whole thing and I finished it,” Stewart said.

Last year, it was Keselowski and Denny Hamlin who took turns beating on each other, with no real consequences, and at the season-ending race at Homestead-Miami Speedway, Stewart and Juan Pablo Montoya crashed each other deliberately in the race and then had a good laugh about it afterwards.

Regardless of NASCAR's public stance on aggressiveness at any given point in time, the reality is that Sprint Cup race is — and always has been — a self-policing sport.

I would suggest that there was only one major difference between the Keselowski-Edwards fight and 100 others that have happened over the last 25 years: Keselowski ended up on his roof. Had Edwards simply put him into the wall, there wouldn't even be a discussion of penalties today.

But because the No. 12 Penske Dodge rolled over, emotions are high and people are understandably worried about the potential for carnage.

Not going to happen, folks.

It's over and done with. Edwards knows it. Keselowski knows it. Score is settled, time to move on.

NASCAR has gotten what it wanted with its new, hands-off policy: Boys behaving badly. Real emotion. Controversy. Debate. Discussion. Energized fans.

I don't know about you, but I thought the end of the Kobalt Tools 500 was a lot more engaging than another Jimmie Johnson victory.

Besides, NASCAR can't have it both ways: You can't tell the world you're taking the restraints off and encouraging drivers to both self-police and show emotion and then cut their onions off when they do just that.

Let 'em race.

Let 'em fight.

Let 'em settle it.

Have at it, boys? Not just, yeah, but hell, yeah.

Tom Jensen is the Editor in Chief of SPEEDtv.com, Senior NASCAR Editor at RACER and a contributing Editor for TruckSeries.com. You can follow him online at twitter.com/tomjensen100 and e-mail him at Jensen is the author of “Cheating: The Bad Things Good NASCAR Nextel Cup Racers Do In Pursuit of Speed,” and has appeared on numerous television and radio shows. Jensen is the past President of the National Motorsports Press Association and an NMPA Writer of the Year.

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