Kevin Harvick on repercussions of Ty Gibbs and Chris Gabehart’s heated Watkins Glen exchange: “The whole race fell apart”

Joe Gibbs Racing driver Ty Gibbs recently had a heated exchange with his race strategist, Chris Gabehart, during the Cup Series race at Watkins Glen. The exchange was heard on the team radio.

The 22-year-old drives the #54 Toyota Camry XSE for Joe Gibbs Racing. The driver and his strategist made headlines due to their heated exchange during Sunday's Cup Series race. The driver expressed his frustration to his team as he struggled to find grip, but the tone did not sit right with the veteran race strategist, as he responded in a similar tone over the radio.

Veteran driver Kevin Harvick spoke about the same on his Happy Hour podcast. He mentioned the incident and highlighted the moment where the 'whole race fell apart'.

"You definitely don't want to have the banter between crew chief and driver like that, and you know once that happened, the whole race fell apart. And you know when the race falls apart like that it's kind of like we talk with the fight like you can clearly point to say 'okay, here's where this started,' and so I think when you look at the situation that I've been in those scenarios before, and as a frustrated driver, you feel like the car is all of a sudden is falling off and not doing what you want it to do. There was definitely some tension on the radio about the strategy and where the car was at that time." (26:43 onwards)

Ty Gibbs had a race to forget at Watkins Glen, as he finished in 33rd place. He currently sits in 17th place with 493 points, 4 top-fives, and 6 top-tens to his name.

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Chris Gabehart speaks about his radio exchange with Ty Gibbs

During the Watkins Glen race on Sunday, Ty Gibbs had a heated exchange with his race strategist and competition director at Joe Gibbs Racing. The 22-year-old finished the race in 33rd place, which marked his third consecutive finish outside the top 20.

The whole incident took place with 34 laps to go as Gibbs struggled to find the grip with his car. Gabehart assured the driver that the issue would be dealt with in the next pit stop and encouraged the driver to finish the cycle. However, this wasn't enough for Ty Gibbs, as he spoke on the radio, saying:

“We’re f****d right now, so we’ve got to do something different,” he yelled on his team’s radio.

To which Gabehart replied by saying:

“Well, I’m sure you’ve got a real good understanding of that from inside the car…so you can call the strategy if you want or we can keep rolling. But I (would) do the best I could to go as fast as I can.”

Post-race, Chris Gabehart explained the radio to the fans. He said:

“Of course, it’s heated. It’s a hot day, and the driver’s working his butt off in there and doesn’t know the details of who’s on what for strategy,” Gabehart said. “There was a caution that fell there early in Stage 2 that really split the field a lot of different ways. So for drivers, that’s always the most confusing time because they don’t know how to measure their car against whom and what’s the next play in the playbook.”

As things stand, Ty Gibbs is the only Cup Series driver from the Joe Gibbs Racing team who has yet to make it to the playoffs.