NASCAR champion Kevin Harvick and Formula 1 broadcaster Will Buxton, on their podcast SPEED, found common ground on whether drivers should be allowed to compete across multiple racing series. Both argued for greater leniency from team owners.

The background of this discussion centers around NASCAR star Kyle Larson, who is balancing an excellent Cup Series record with major events outside stock car racing.

Harvick traced the roots of NASCAR's restrictive culture to the Hendrick era.

“Back in the day with Hendrick Motorsports was, you can't race anything else. Jeff Gordon, Jimmie Johnson, Casey Kahne, whoever drove there, you weren't racing anything else unless you got it approved,” he said.

He then contrasted that with his own experience at Richard Childress Racing. “I'd race 70, 80 times a year. I'd race late models, O'Reilly truck, Cup cars, whatever it was.”

The issue, as Harvick pointed out, was drivers going to outside competitions and getting injured, especially in open-wheel racing or sprint cars.

“There's a lot of things that can go wrong,” he stated.

But Harvick saw Larson's case as a turning point. “In order for Hendrick Motorsports to hire Kyle Larson, they had to let him race,” he added.

Buxton also agreed with Harvick, pointing to Max Verstappen's recent Nürburgring outings, where the four-time Formula 1 champion raced in the Nürburgring Langstrecken-Serie and made his Nürburgring 24 Hours debut in 2026.

“The American mindset appears to be more sort of in line with, we want to race everything we can all the time,” Buxton said. He continued, “I'm in favor of it. I'd love to see more of it.”

In fact, there are several successful examples that would add value to Harvick and Buxton's claims.

Tony Stewart’s Career Shows the Value of Racing Across Multiple Disciplines

The strongest evidence supporting Harvick's argument comes in the form of Tony Stewart.

Before becoming a NASCAR superstar, Stewart won the 1997 Indy Racing League (IRL), completed USAC's Triple Crown in 1995, and later added three Cup Series titles and 49 victories to his résumé.

Harvick also pointed to the same example as he added, “And sprint cars, we went through a phase where we were breaking backs and having injuries. Tony Stewart used to do it all the time. He broke his leg, got in some trouble.”

Despite those setbacks, Stewart continued racing and remains the only driver to complete all 1,100 miles and finish on the lead lap in both the Indianapolis 500 and Coca-Cola 600 on the same day, reinforcing Harvick's argument.

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Written by

Uday Jakhar

Edited by

Pulkit Prabhav