Ricky Stenhouse Jr. admits confusion over NASCAR fine, penalties following Kyle Busch fight

Ricky Stenhouse Jr. doesn’t understand why he received a large fine from NASCAR for his fight with Kyle Busch. The 36-year-old driver appeared on Fox’s NASCAR Race Hub on Wednesday and was asked about his reaction to the fine and the penalties for his team.

“I would say a little confused at some of it,” Stenhouse said while adding he knew some type of punishment was coming. He added that he’s “a little confused at the whole situation,” but “that’s part of it, that’s NASCAR’s rule book. They can do what they please and we’re going to go race this weekend at Charlotte as if anything didn’t happen and put our foot forward in regards to that.”

Stenhouse was then asked what parts of the punishment that has him confused. “Just the driver-on-driver aspect of it,” he explained. “It seems aggressive on all fronts and a little less aggressive in other areas as you can pick out. But like I said it’s part of it. That’s done with. The All-Star Race was last week and no we got Charlotte to go take care of.”

Stenhouse was fined $75,000 for his involvement in the fight with Busch. Additionally, two of Stenhouse’s crew members have been suspended for multiple races and Stenhouse’s father, Ricky Stenhouse Sr., has been suspended indefinitely. The fight happened after Busch bumped into Stenhouse which led to him hitting the wall and being eliminated from the race.

Ricky Stenhouse Jr. had mixed emotions after his wreck with Kyle Busch

“I was sitting in the hauler wishing I could leave for one thing,” Stenhouse said when asked what was going through his mind between the wreck and the fight. “I couldn’t, so I thought well, while I’m here, we’ll go ahead and have this conversation.

“I think for me my emotions were up and down. At some points, I was probably over it, and at other points, I was still frustrated that I was still sitting there and not in the race. …Going over to talk to Kyle I was more hoping that maybe he would apologize and say, ‘Hey maybe I crossed the line there.’ Wrecking somebody on purpose is pretty aggressive, especially for I feel like the situation that happened there on Lap 1. That didn’t happen, and it obviously escalated from there.

Stenhouse was also asked if he would have handled the situation differently. “I wish I wouldn’t have parked in his pit box. That kind of pissed his crew guys off,” he said. “Obviously, they had nothing to do with it.”