Joey Logano spent a couple of harrowing minutes upside down on the Talladega track, waiting for NASCAR crews to flip his car back onto its wheels, and his first words after the chaos? He’s “happy to be alive.” The Team Penske driver walked away uninjured from a brutal wreck where he got turned into the wall, flipped completely over, and slid for hundreds of feet on his roof. You heard that right, *upside down*.
The Wild Ride From Hell
This wasn’t just a fender bender. Logano described a hard hit, going into the wall, and then the sickening feeling of his car going “up in the air and thought, ‘Oh sh–.’” He said it got “pretty quiet there,” which is terrifying when you’re in the middle of a race, and then the brakes stopped working because, well, the wheels weren’t on the ground anymore. It flew for a while, and then the landing was just hoping not to get slammed again while sliding inverted. His main worry, the thing that made him say he’s “happy to be alive,” was seeing fuel leak out. Can you even imagine? He even admitted, “I’ve never felt like I can’t get out of a race car before, and I kind of felt like I couldn’t get out if I had to.” Logano praised the NASCAR medical team and the car’s safety, confirming he was “100 percent good to drive home” after getting out under his own power. Riley Herbst was also involved, taking a hard hit, but he appeared okay too, just getting his wrist wrapped as he left the medical center. The only real issue was Logano’s radio, which stopped working likely because an antenna got crunched during the slide, cutting off communication with his team.
No Blame, Just Brutal Racing
Logano was battling among the leaders when the wreck went down. Ross Chastain, a lapped car, was in front of him, and Logano felt a bit boxed in, especially since he didn’t have any Ford teammates to work with. But he wasn’t throwing shade, saying everyone has a right to race for themselves and it wasn’t Chastain’s fault. Chastain, in a wild twist, even got the free pass after the incident and ended up finishing fourth. Logano also didn’t blame Carson Hocevar for the shove that initiated the whole mess, recognizing it’s the end of the race and Hocevar had been pushing him well. It was “just right in the wrong spot,” a classic Talladega moment that “shipped” him right into the fence. Logano joked it was “a Ricky Bobby moment at Talladega , more than I would like.” He sums up superspeedway racing perfectly, saying “It really sucks at times. At times, it’s pretty awesome. And at times you end up on your lid and you say, ‘It sucks.’”
Next week, Logano’s heading to Martinsville, a short track he explicitly stated he likes. After a ride like that, can you blame him for wanting to keep all four wheels on the ground and facing the right direction? This is the wild, unpredictable beast of speedway racing, folks, and sometimes, all you can do is be thankful you’re walking away.
This article was created with AI assistance and published under Seattle On Tap’s editorial standards. See our Editorial Policy.
Originally reported by Fox Sports.
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