Joey Logano will start from the pole in Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series Pennzoil 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, the driver’s second pole position and third-consecutive front-row starting spot to begin the season.
But last weekend at Atlanta Motor Speedway, Logano qualified second and had to drop to the rear of the field before the start of the race and then was fined $10,000 on Tuesday due to competition and safety violations involving his driving gloves.
Following his latest pole-winning run, Logano shouldered his portion of the blame for the penalties stemming from the glove but explained that he didn’t create the glove.
“As a driver, you work with the team. And I’m going to take a portion of the responsibility for that too,” Logano said. “Obviously, I should. I put the glove on. That being said, I didn’t build the glove. I didn’t make it on my own. I can’t sew, okay. That’s what it was. We had conversations about it.”
Logano admitted that the situation wasn’t his proudest moment, but that he takes pride in how he and his No. 22 Team Penske team rebounded from the penalties in qualifying at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
“What I’m proud about with this team is that it was a tough situation for us to go through, and embarrassing for sure. But the fact that we got through it and just moved on and focused on the next week. We showed we have some speed in our race car, and to be able to put it on the pole is a statement-type lap. Proud of that,” Logano explained.
While the gloves were deemed a safety violation, Logano explained that he never felt a concern wearing the gloves behind the wheel, and he says that he strictly only used them in single-car qualifying runs.
“No. I personally did not [feel unsafe],” Logano stated. “I would never put myself in a situation where I feel unsafe. I have a wife, I have a family that I care way more about than race cars. And yeah, no I didn’t feel concerned with what we did. I didn’t race with it, qualifying on speedways is pretty simple.”
On Saturday, NASCAR officials showed off the glove to the Media to further explain the reasoning for the penalties prior to last week’s race at Atlanta Motor Speedway.
NASCAR’s Brad Moran explained that the webbing added to the glove, which created an aerodynamic advantage for Logano, when he placed his hand up to the window net during his qualifying run at Atlanta Motor Speedway, was not on the glove when it was given its SFI approval, which made the glove a violation of safety standards.
NASCAR displays the confiscated glove from the No. 22. pic.twitter.com/OSOkRoQEEG
— NASCAR (@NASCAR) March 2, 2024
