Come on now…
Bubba Wallace is obviously one of the most polarizing figures in NASCAR.
The driver of the #23 car for 23XI Racing, owned by Michael Jordan and Denny Hamlin, has found himself at the center of controversy – some of it not of his own making – during his time in NASCAR, notably drawing attention back in 2020 when it was reported that a noose was found in his garage stall that turned out to just be the rope used to pull the garage door.
He’s also an emotional driver, earning a suspension last season for cutting across the track to wreck Kyle Larson during a playoff race last year before confronting Larson in the grass after the drivers climbed out of their wrecked race cars.
As a result, Bubba often earns more boos than other NASCAR drivers, something that Wallace was asked after the Truck Series race on Friday – admitting that it doesn’t make him feel great.
The Cup Series was at North Wilkesboro Speedway this weekend for the first time since 1996 as the series held its annual All-Star Race at one of NASCAR’s original tracks.
Wallace had a solid day, finishing 2nd after Larson ended up dominating most of the race.
But after the race was over, fans who were listening in on Bubba’s team radio communications heard something odd come across at the end of the race.
Apparently some fans were able to get on to the radio frequency used by Bubba’s team to communicate with each other during the race. And they had some less-than-nice words for the driver:
“Go back to where you came from you asshole.”
“You’re not wanted in NASCAR.”
Several fans reported hearing the comments on the radio, though according to his team, Bubba apparently didn’t hear the unwanted messages.
It was reported after the race that NASCAR security is investigating the incident:
While NASCAR radios are open to fans to listen to, it’s not unheard of for mischievous fans to find their way on to a team’s radio and cause chaos for a team.
During the 2018 Coca-Cola 600, a fan was able to hijack radios of multiple teams, asking Kyle Busch how his tires were doing and telling Alex Bowman to “shut the f*** up.”
And even Bubba has been a victim in the past, after someone broke onto his radio frequency during last year’s Coca-Cola 600 and said “white lives matter.”
Unfortunately there’s not much teams can do when somebody unwanted finds their way onto the team radio, other than switch to a backup channel.
Just hope these clowns don’t ruin it for the rest of us and force NASCAR to go to a system that doesn’t let fans listen in.
