It’s been the story you’ve been hearing about since Sunday (Oct. 30) — Ross Chastain put his No. 1 Chevrolet against the wall and floored it, passing numerous cars who took the corner the proper way and speeding into the Championship 4.
All over the motorsports globe, folks have had an opinion on whether they thought Chastain’s move was one good for NASCAR or one that the sport should review to prevent something like this from happening in the future. Frontstretch‘s own Vito Pugliese and Mark Kristl debate NASCAR’s hottest current topic.
Here Comes The Fun Police
Let me start off by saying, the “Haul-Ass Wall Pass” will go down in history as one of the iconic moments in NASCAR.
It’s on the same plane as the Pass in the Grass, the final lap at the 1992 Winston and Cale Yarborough beating on Bobby Allison’s fist with his face in the 1979 Daytona 500. The reach Chastain’s move had in the 48 hours since it happened has been equally transcendent on news shows and across all social media platforms.
It’s a positive because it helped do two things: purge our memories of the Bowman Gray Stadium-esque garbage move Ty Gibbs executed the day before and help push the Bubba Wallace/Kyle Larson incident further into the recesses of our collective memory.
With that said, here comes the Fun Police to ruin it for everyone.
I think some of the faux-furrowed brow hand-wringing about it being “embarrassing” for the sport is a bit precious. We’ve had bar-room brawls break out the last two weeks after and during a race, and one of the most talented drivers in the series had to quit Sunday with concussion-like symptoms after bending the steering wheel after bumping into another car in traffic. We had the heir to one of the flagship rides in all of motorsports intentionally wreck his teammate, then compare himself to (checks notes) … Jesus.
Yeah, I can think of a couple of things right off the bat that are embarrassing and more harmful to the sport than the Leeroy Jenkins – World of Warcraft send that Chastain managed to pull off.
Now, do I feel it sets a bad precedent? Absolutely, it does.
Let’s say there’s the exact same scenario next spring at Martinsville Speedway. Not for the win, obviously not for anything playoff-related, but someone trying to get a top 10 with a 15th-place car. They pull it a lap earlier, break something and then a caution comes out. There is nothing more infuriating than someone running mid-pack or…
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