DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – The differences of opinion between Erik Jones and Ryan Blaney still persist, nearly a week and a half after their run-in at the Busch Light Clash. During Daytona 500 Media Day, both confirmed that they haven‘t spoken since the incident at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, but that they‘ve also tried to turn the page.
In the moment, Blaney showed his displeasure for their on-track contact by throwing his HANS device at Jones‘ No. 43 Chevrolet from the track‘s infield. Jones drove on to a fourth-place result, but Blaney wound up 17th, three laps off the pace in his No. 12 Ford.
“No, he hasn‘t reached out to me, so I guess it‘s resolved,” Jones said Wednesday from Daytona International Speedway. “I don‘t know. You know, I guess if I had a problem with someone, I would talk to ‘em. So I guess it‘s over.”
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Like Jones, Blaney said he had also put the incident in his rearview, but that no communication to potentially mend any hard feelings had taken place.
“No, I haven‘t talked to Erik. I don‘t really have anything to talk to him about,” Blaney said. “I‘m over it. I don‘t know. It‘s funny he thought I was supposed to apologize after I got fenced. But just, two people are gonna think differently. But no, I haven‘t talked to him, but I‘m over it. It‘s in the past and move on from it.”
After Blaney‘s display of anger in LA, he questioned Jones‘ tactics in a televised interview, wondering why he was racing full-bore in a low-reward contest for seventh place. FOX Sports‘ Jamie Little noted that Blaney‘s outburst seemed out of character. Jones said Wednesday he wasn‘t entirely surprised by the reaction.
“The way I look at it, if I‘m racing somebody and I brake-checked them, I guess I‘d expect to get wrecked,” Jones said. “It‘s not like I meant to take the guy out of the race. You know, I didn‘t just intentionally right-rear him in the wall, move him up the track. He got in the wall and broke a piece, and unfortunately that took him farther out of the race. So yeah, he‘s probably upset about that, for sure. He was having a solid run there, obviously. We‘re kind of moving forward together. But yeah, I mean, frustrated. I don‘t know. I wasn‘t I guess shocked to see it at all. I knew he‘d probably be mad about it, so just kinda waiting on it.”
