In-car camera footage from Hudson O’Neal’s car was recently uploaded to YouTube and it shows O’Neal spinning out Tyler Carpenter during the Gateway Dirt National’s Saturday night feature race.
In the video below, Carpenter can be seen hugging the bottom of the track before he moves up to the top in between Ryan Unzicker and O’Neal down the straightaway. As he begins to enter the next corner, O’Neal flat out hits him in the rear and spins him out.
In-car footage from Steve Sheppard’s car also shows Carpenter did indeed retaliate against him rather than O’Neal following the conclusion of the race. After Sheppard takes the checkered flag with Carpenter behind him, Sheppard’s car is spun out as he’s heading into Turn 2. Sheppard is then seen flicking off Carpenter with both hands.
Unfortunately, the footage does not show anymore of the post-race run-ins between Sheppard and Carpenter.
Carpenter’s in-car footage does show him spinning out Sheppard at the end of the race. It also shows Carpenter being run into by Sheppard as he was making his way through the infield and attempting to block him from getting back to the garage area and then doing a burnout on Sheppard’s nose.
Given the in-car footage clearly confirms that it was O’Neal who spun out Carpenter, Carpenter’s threat of payback following the race is clearly aimed at O’Neal.
Carpenter told FloRacing, “I know who did it. I definitely know who did it now. And what goes around comes around. It really will come around.”
However, in a post to Facebook he appeared to walk that back, “Saturday I won the qualifier #5 securing me in the feature. I started 11th, ended up getting spun and sent to tail. I didn’t make much headway after that. I ended up finishing 11th. I wasn’t sure who took me out, I honestly didn’t care and I wasn’t going after revenge. To be completely truthful, I didn’t purposely spin Sheppard.”
“After the race, he kept ramming me through the infield, stopping in front of me, then ramming my rearend coming off the track. At that point I put it in reverse and backed it up into him. I went to my pit and stayed there. I had no clue what was going on afterwards. I don’t condone violence in that way and I sure as hell didn’t send anyone after him.”
“Racing is racing, especially at the dome everyone gets into everyone a little. I have no hard feelings at all towards anyone. I may say stuff when the camera is right in my face after a disappointing finish but that’s part of it. It all blows over and you’re onto the next race,” he stated.
What do you make of this in-car footage?