Clearing things up.
Things got heated in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race last night when 20-year old Daniel Dye and his spotter, Kevin Hamlin, seemingly had a heated argument on the radio that resulted in Hamlin radioing the crew chief and threatening to quit mid-race.
The 20-year old Dye is in his second year running full-time in the Truck Series, after finishing 18th in the points during his first full season.
Kevin Hamlin, meanwhile, spots for Alex Bowman in the Cup Series and Sam Mayer in the Xfinity Series.
The spotter was trying to let Dye know that he was racing his teammate Tyler Ankrum in the #18 truck, who had new tires, too hard, and was hurting his own lap times:
“Teammate with tires, you can’t drive him to the f*cking apron dude.”
And then comes the part that both parties say was misheard:
“I was lifted up, he can kiss my ass.”
Hamlin was quick to fire back:
“You and I are gonna have a chat when this is over, because there’s a reason you’re six spots behind where we started.”
The spotter then switched over to the team’s second channel, which the driver can’t hear, to talk directly to crew chief Blake Bainbridge:
“This motherf*cker tells me to kiss his ass one more time Blake, and you guys are going to be on the box because I’m going to be headed to the house. 10-4?”
But according to both Hamlin and Dye the entire exchange was actually just a big misunderstanding.
After we reported on the incident earlier today, Hamlin took to Reddit to clear things up and explain that he and Dye had cleared things up:
“For what it’s worth, Daniel and I spoke this morning. I didn’t hear the “he can” before the rest of what he said. It came right after some tough love and I misheard him and I got pissed off too quick, which is fairly typical for me.”
The spotter also had some kind words for his driver, while saying that he would be stepping away to allow someone else to spot for Dye in the Truck Series:
