NASCAR's Elton Sawyer recaps 'disaster' Martinsville Xfinity race, will meet with drivers at Darlington

This past Saturday’s Xfinity Series race at Martinsville featured 14 cautions and 102 caution laps. The race has widely been panned by NASCAR veterans, who took issue with the lack of respect on the racetrack.

NASCAR senior vice president of competition Elton Sawyer wasn’t sure who was driving the racecars that day. He called the race a “disaster” during a Wednesday appearance on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.

“The Xfinity guys have an opportunity to go back there [to Martinsville] in the fall and redeem themselves on a race, obviously a lot of discussion around,” Sawyer said, via Dustin Long of NBC Sports. “I’m not sure who was driving the cars because most of the Xfinity guys that I know and been around and watched them race, watched them race at Homestead the week before, I think there was other drivers in the car because it was a disaster.”

Contact was plentiful between drivers in Saturday’s race. But perhaps nothing was more egregious than Sammy Smith‘s conduct on the final lap of the race. Smith slammed into race-leader Taylor Gray on the final corner, taking them both out of contention and allowing Austin Hill to drive by to take the checkered flag. 

Smith slid across the start/finish line 10th, while Gray finished 29th. The two drivers exchanged words after the race and had to be separated before things turned physical. NASCAR penalized Smith for his actions. Smith was fined $25,000 and docked 50 points.

Xfinity Series drivers will meet with NASCAR officials at Darlington

“Historically, we’ve tried to stay with points and money on a situation like that,” Sawyer said. ” … Sammy is a prime example of a young man that’s got a great deal of talent. Obviously made some mistakes at the end of that race that he’s going to have to learn from. We have to step in and help him with that process and that’s what we did.

“But there was a multitude of bad decisions that was made by a multitude of drivers throughout that event, and we plan to address that with the garage this weekend at Darlington.”

Sawyer said that NASCAR officials will meet with Xfinity drivers this coming Saturday at Darlington. “Respect” was the word of the day for this past Sunday’s Cup Series race. Sounds like it will be again at Darlington.

“I think it’s mostly just letting them understand or at least give them the message of how they can process what happened [last] Saturday and how they learn from that and earn the respect of their fellow competitors,” Sawyer said. “NASCAR racing, we’ve been built on, pushing and shoving is fine, tire marks are fine and that’s OK. It’s a contact sport. We totally get that.

“But we do have to step in from time to time when they cross the line. And we just want to let them know that this is crossing the line, and we will step in. You guys race with respect, you don’t have to like each other and totally understand that, but you do have to respect each other and go out there and race like you have the ability to do. It takes zero talent, zero talent, to do and make some of the moves that those guys made on Saturday.”