Toyota Racing – Denny Hamlin
NASCAR Cup Series Quotes
BRISTOL, Tenn. (September 20, 2024) – Joe Gibbs Racing driver Denny Hamlin was made available to the media on Friday prior to practice for the NASCAR Cup Series race at Bristol Motor Speedway.
DENNY HAMLIN, No. 11 FedEx Toyota Camry XSE, Joe Gibbs Racing
What is your mindset going into the race – points or do you think you need to win?
“I’m coming here to win. That strategy won’t change unless the situation changes during the race.”
How would you describe this round of the Playoffs? Is it frustrating?
“Yeah, that’s a good word for it, for sure. I think that when we saw how the tracks were placed in the Playoffs and whatnot, and we knew the adding of Atlanta was going to put some variability in the results that you can’t always plan for, but still you have to execute and certainly, you look at the top five and you look at the bottom five – it is not something you would have predicted and not have seen for the first 27 or 28 races in the year, but it is a new ballgame now, and you still have to go out there and perform, so frustrating, being that we haven’t had the results – but today is a new opportunity.”
I saw that Stephen A. Smith at 23XI. Can you describe how that came together?
“Obviously, his relationship with Michael (Jordan) is pretty close, and we had a great sponsor summit over a two-day period at Airspeed over the week. He came and did a speaking engagement for us, which was fantastic.”
When you communicate with NASCAR, are they receptive to the conversations concerning competition items?
“Truthfully, I’m not aware of any conversations that the teams have or the drivers have as far as the influence on the schedule. Competition, yeah – there are certainly rules that they are continuing to look on how to make short tracks better and really putting an emphasis over the last year on the tire. We definitely saw something in the right direction at Watkins Glen and some of the other short tracks. I’m really excited to see what happens at Martinsville with that tire. I think we are trending in a direction that we used to race at decades ago, to age myself, but still the parts and pieces are all the same, it is going to put it in the drivers hands to go out, like this weekend, and differentiate yourself, but yeah, I think that the collaboration has been good on the competition side, but ultimately, they will still makes decisions based on what they think is best and react to given situations.”
With Bubba Wallace’s extension, has anything changed with the charters?
“No, nothing has changed on that side with all of that. We’ve said for a while that we plan on racing next year no matter what, so we are sticking to that.”
On Bubba Wallace’s extension, did you feel like that was a no brainer?
“The 23 team needs to make the Playoffs every year. I think that is our expectation, and then make a deep run and finish in the top-10 in points. That is kind of our expectation of kind of where we are at. Just getting in, it is hard for me to say that is the only expectation, but it is an expectation given the standards we are giving ourselves. He knows that he needs to get better. I think he has gotten better, so as long as he continues that – last year, when he made it on driver points, he was 14th, this year, 12th – while it won’t look great in the final box score, because once you get in, who knows where you go, your floor is only 16th – this year, it is going to look worse than last year, but we know that given the stats he has had, the laps that he has led – everything has improved over what he had last year, just have to take the next step.”
Did your sponsors at the 23XI summit ask more questions about the charters or you moving forward in the Playoffs?
“It was a little bit of both. We were really strong in our messaging that nothing is changing from our employee standpoint to our sponsor standpoint going forward, what battles we have off of the race track is on ownership. We are going to make sure that no one is adversely affected by all of that.”
What have you seen from Bubba Wallace on his growth?
“I think his willingness to continue to learn is something that I see that is very, very positive – not that he didn’t in the past, I think his willingness to put himself out there in vulnerable situations to ask for help when he needs it has been very encouraging, and certainly, we’ve seen from my standpoint more pace on road course, more pace at tracks typically that he wasn’t as fast at, that he needed to be, so I think all of that is good. His feedback has gotten better. That is very, very important. As long as he continues on that trajectory, he will be fine.”
What do you need to see from the officials this weekend if we have a similar race at Bristol than we did in the Spring?
“Just consistency on whatever is a caution early, it is the same caution that is late. If you are willing to let guys run around the bottom or the top with a flat tire, let them do that at the end of the race as well. Just consistency as far as that is concerned. If it is called tight in the beginning, call it tight at the end. If it is called loose in the beginning, call it loose at the end. Those are kind of the only consistencies that competition would be looking for.”
Have you seen any other discrepancies, especially on the short tracks?
“I’m not sure. Sometimes I feel like it depends on how tight we are on our TV window, truthfully. If I had to kind of draw conclusions on when we want cautions and when we don’t, but that is just my tin foil hat theory.”
Is it an advantage knowing you are battling with your teammates or a disadvantage?
“I’m not really sure. Probably a disadvantage because we have had success here and they know what we had in our car to make it work so well, things like that. If they were with a different team, maybe you get your competition panicking or guessing – okay, we don’t have enough pace – we need to wholesale our car and then you end up missing it big, but still, I think it is still so tight, I think it is just going to be who outruns who. Hopefully, things work out in our favor, but if not, certainly, we have some team cars – all of our cars, there are three of them in the question mark there – it would awesome to get all three of them in, but odds are, we are going to get more than one.”
Does the tire management possibility excite you?
“If I had a preference, I would prefer it not be that way, just because it is another variable that is thrown into the mix, and we talk about cautions – is that untimely caution really going to cost you. If you make the nice, conservative call to go ahead and pit before your tires go flat, and someone else doesn’t and caution comes out and it traps you laps down, certainly, it could have some big implications, so truthfully, I would kind of let it be the natural fall race that we’ve had where the best cars and best drivers run their way to the front, but if it is a crazy race, we have to adapt and I feel like we are prepared for either.”
How important is qualifying at Bristol?
“It is not totally indicative if I don’t qualify well, the rallying cry will be, well, we can win from anywhere, right? If you do qualify well, well, it is a great start to the weekend, but certainly, you don’t want to set any kind of panic in on your team or anything like that. I’m not going to be, regardless of the result, but again, I’m going to be on the offense, starting right away – I’m going to be fine with the result – either way – because I know, over 500 laps here, things will work their selves out and we will have a shot to win.”
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