Devastation of Hurricane Helene Puts Joey Logano's Second Chance in Perspective

• Hendrick Motorsports decided not to appeal NASCAR’s post-race ruling that Alex Bowman’s Chevrolet was underweight.

• The decision propelled Joey Logano into the Round of 8 in the NASCAR Cup Playoffs.

• Hendrick Motorsports vice chairman Jeff Gordon told The Morning Drive on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio that “We’re pretty embarrassed by it.”

Rarely does an athlete receive a second chance at a championship, but that’s the case for Joey Logano who was out of NASCAR’s Round of 8 when he left Charlotte Motor Speedway after the Bank of America Roval 400 only to be back in it a few hours later after Alex Bowman was disqualified from the event.

Logano was at his home, visiting with a 7-year-old cancer patient and playing foosball when his phone started “ringing off the hook.” However, it was a text from Team Penske competition director Travis Geisler that officially notified him he was back in the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs.

“You’re still kind of cautiously optimistic because you’re thinking, well, there will probably be an appeal. If there is, then we may not know until later,” Logano said. “So, you just kind of keep going on with your life and preparing for the next race.”

When Hendrick Motorsports decided not to appeal NASCAR’s post-race ruling that Bowman’s Chevrolet was underweight, Logano and his team didn’t have to cling to hope that the ruling wouldn’t be overturned by an appeals panel. Hendrick Motorsports vice chairman Jeff Gordon told The Morning Drive on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio that “we’ve got to stay as close to those minimums as possible and in this case the 48 car was just too close and just missed it. That’s on us. We’re pretty embarrassed by it.”

When Sunday’s race concluded, Logano had missed advancing in the playoffs for the driver championship by a slim four points. A mere four points that made him think of the last lap spin by Austin Dillon at Richmond and the 28-car crash at Talladega. Crew chief Paul Wolfe reminded Logano they were still in contention for the owner’s title and that’s the one that determines the financial bonuses to the crew. However, it was the driver title that meant everything to Logano, not the “secret championship nobody knows about.”

Logano admits without hesitation that it’s been a “wild roller-coaster of emotions” for him. He notes that statistics paint him as an underdog. He enters the Round of 8 below the cutline and in 32 races this season’s he’s only produced two victories, five top-five and 10 top-10 finishes. However, he doesn’t believe his team feels that it’s an underdog.

“We’ve been steadily getting better and improving throughout the season to where we are now,” Logano said. “We feel very confident in our race team that we can make a run at this thing and get ourselves into the Championship Four. Just expect the unexpected.”

While Logano is getting a second chance at his third NASCAR Cup Series championship, he’s working via his Foundation to give Western North Carolina residents devastated by Hurricane Helene a second chance.

Two days before the Charlotte race. Logano, his wife and members of his Joey Logano Foundation traveled to WNC to determine the residents’ needs. They took a dozen generators, 10 chainsaws, sleeping bags and Pennzoil with them, but he discovered that in some cases he couldn’t provide the people with what they needed, for they needed family members they had lost in the horrendous flooding and mudslides.

“It’s so breathtaking and heartbreaking to hear the stories of people,” Logano told The Morning Drive. “There are cars that you can’t figure out what they were before. The positive is there are a ton of people helping, but the people who live there are still screwed. They’re going through hell.”