NASCAR star breaks silence on ugly pit row fight with rival

Ryan Blaney knew how it looked.He admitted his confrontation with Carson Hocevar did not go as planned.

Following a dustup that ended Blaney’s race Saturday night at the Bass Pro Shops Night Race in Bristol, Tenn., the 32-year-old American walked up to Hocevar on pit row, grabbing him and yelling at him before Hocevar got in two punches.After the two were separated, Blaney broke free and ran down Hocevar, punching him, before the two were separated for good.“I’ll be honest, I went over there and I got my ass kicked, for sure,” Blaney said as a guest on fellow racer Denny Hamlin’s podcast “Actions Detrimental.” “I ate a two piece, and got tagged pretty good.

I just wanted to show my displeasure.”“I didn’t have a huge plan.Really, the only plan of mine was, you know, ‘I’m going to have a stern conversation with Carson,'” he went on.

“I wasn’t planning on throwing anything.I just really wanted to grab him and pretty much yell at him, you know, and show my displeasure.

And granted, I kind of grabbed him pretty aggressively — that, you’re probably going to defend yourself, you know? And he rightfully did.”The tiff stemmed from a maneuver Hocevar pulled off during the race.As 43 laps remained, he crossed behind Blaney and got inside his left side.While heading into a turn, neither driver backed off and Hocevar made contact, spinning Blaney out of the track and into the wall to end his race.After the race and brawl, Hocevar admitted he would “be mad at me, too.”“Whether it was his mistake, my mistake, my fault or not, I’d be pretty pissed if I was him,” he said.“I saw him coming, and he’s moving pretty fast, and then he grabbed me, and I was like, ‘OK, I’m not going to wait.’ I’ve seen enough of these.

I’m going to start swinging and see what happens.”Blaney later confessed on the podcast that he regretted the way he acted, stating it was ” really unlike” him and he tries to “set a good example for...