Photo: Andrew Mullins/AFP
Internal text messages among NASCAR’s top executives, unsealed Friday as part of the discovery process in an ongoing antitrust lawsuit, have provided a rare and unfiltered look at the sanctioning body’s aggressive posture toward perceived competition.
The revelations are expected to bolster the claims of plaintiffs 23XI Racing and Front Row Motorsports as their landmark trial against NASCAR is set to begin Dec. 1.
The unsealed messages, exchanged primarily between NASCAR Commissioner Steve Phelps and now-NASCAR President Steve O’Donnell in 2022 and 2023, reveal a concerted effort to undermine the rival Superstar Racing Experience, or SRX, series. The texts contradict NASCAR’s public stance of allowing Cup Series drivers to compete in the short-track series.
The most explosive messages came in an exchange concerning the 2023 participation of 23XI Racing co-owner and Cup Series star Denny Hamlin in an SRX event.
According to the documents, O’Donnell texted Phelps, “Enough. We need legal to take a shot at this.”
Phelps responded with a sharply worded attack on the series, writing: “These guys are just plain stupid. Need to put a knife in this trash series.”
In the same text chain, Phelps expressed further frustration, stating, “The SRX thing is just baffling to me. Why don’t they get it – oh, they do get it and it’s a huge FU to us.” O’Donnell followed up, suggesting an aggressive internal strategy: “So smiles all around but behind the scenes we scheme and we win.”
Another set of messages, while ruled inadmissible at trial due to their inflammatory nature, showed Phelps making highly critical and disparaging remarks about veteran NASCAR team owner Richard Childress after Childress publicly questioned the financial terms of NASCAR’s new media rights deal.
The two-car 23XI Racing team, co-owned by NBA legend Michael Jordan and Hamlin, along with Front Row Motorsports, filed the federal antitrust lawsuit in October 2024. The teams refused to sign the 2025-2031 charter extension, which governs their guaranteed entry into races and share of the sport’s revenue.
The core of the plaintiffs’ complaint is that NASCAR operates as an illegal monopoly, using its complete control over the premier stock-car racing market to suppress team revenue and restrict competition from outside entities. They argue the current charter system and NASCAR’s mandate that teams buy most car parts from single-source suppliers make their business model economically unviable.
Attorneys for 23XI Racing and Front Row Motorsports are expected to present the released text messages as direct evidence of anti-competitive intent on the part of NASCAR leadership. The harsh language toward a competing series like SRX suggests a corporate strategy aimed at eliminating or suppressing any potential rival that could threaten NASCAR’s dominance, directly supporting the teams’ claims of monopolization.
A recent partial summary judgment in favor of the teams, which defined the relevant market as “premier stock-car racing” and affirmed NASCAR’s power over that market, has already narrowed the scope of the trial. The newly unsealed texts now provide a compelling narrative of corporate ruthlessness that the jury will weigh as they decide whether NASCAR illegally used its power.
The trial is scheduled to begin Dec. 1 in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of North Carolina.