Noah Gragson and Kevin Magnussen didn’t make the greatest of first impressions.
Sunday’s Anduril 250 at Naval Base Coronado in San Diego, the first NASCAR Cup Series event to be run on an active military base, was a full-contact slugfest at times during the 75-lap event. And had it not been for a warning heeded to Gragson after the event, the scene on pit road likely would have devolved into one, also.
Gragson, in an interview with SiriusXM NASCAR Radio Channel 90 on Wednesday, says that he was prepared to run over to Kevin Magnussen post-race at Naval Base Coronado and fight him, but was told before walking over there that doing so would result in “long-term consequences” from his employer.
So, the Las Vegas, Nevada-native says he “really had to restrain” but the conversation between himself and Magnussen, making his NASCAR Cup Series debut driving the No. 91 Chevrolet for PROJECT 91 and Trackhouse Racing, was anything but pleasant – and included lots of words that aren’t safe for work.
For about 15 laps of Sunday’s 75-lap contest, Gragson and Magnussen were at each others’ throats, which involved a ton of on-track contact, a lot of interesting radio communications, and even some door-banging under the caution, before the former Formula 1 driver took matters into his own hands, intentionally wrecking, and ending the day of, the No. 4 Ford Mustang Dark Horse on Lap 38.
Gragson, for what I’m sure were nefarious purposes, wanted to get back on the racetrack, but NASCAR, due to the severity of the damage, would not allow it.
“What I’m most mad about,” Gragson said Wednesday, “is that you’re in our ballpark, and we’re out here and we race the 38-race season, and to come in here on Lap 3 and be jamming it up the inside and running into guys and driving into their doors, not just myself, but other guys, it’s frustrating.”
The Front Row Motorsports driver says this issue isn’t exclusive to Magnussen, and name-dropped Sage Karam into the conversation (who Gragson had a significant run-in with at Road America several years ago in the NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series that got him penalized). Karam, in a reply to audio of the interview, quipped “maybe it’s just you pal”.
“You got other open-wheel guys who come in from open-wheel, and maybe not just open-wheel, I mean some of the V8 [Supercars] guys, not Shane [Van Gisbergen], but Will Brown. We had a pretty funny conversation last year after Daytona, but I think they see how much rougher and how much more contact there is than some FIA forms of motorsports, where F1, they kind of have a zero-touching policy now. We do have a bit of contact, but they feel it’s 10 times more than that, and that’s what pissed me off is you’re coming into our ballpark and running into us.”
However, Gragson realizes that, at least for the time being, there likely won’t be another interaction on track between him and Magnussen.
“It’s a no-win situation. We’re not going to deal with that guy probably ever again. If we do, it’ll be fun, you know, I’d be excited, but if not, it is what it is. I move on. I’m racing this next weekend again, and I’m going to do as good a job as I can for the No. 4 team.”
Gragson will return to another road course this weekend at Sonoma Raceway, but sans Kevin Magnussen.
