Toyota GAZOO Racing – Denny Hamlin
NASCAR Cup Series Quotes
INDIANAPOLIS (July 25, 2025) – Joe Gibbs Racing driver Denny Hamlin was made available to the media on Friday prior to practice for the NASCAR Cup Series race at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
DENNY HAMLIN, No. 11 Progressive Toyota Camry XSE, Joe Gibbs Racing
Is this your contract extension?
“I would say probably, most likely. Who knows, but most likely.”
How have you managed to keep wanting to race year-after-year?
“Kind of a two-fold thing. Some of it is motivating myself. I have goals I want to reach in the Cup Series. I have a really strong relationship with Joe (Gibbs, owner) and his family. An obviously, the ability to win. That’s a high factor to be wanting to do this. I think about that on a weekly basis, would I want to do this if I didn’t have the ability to win as much? Probably not, the motivation wouldn’t be there. Certainly, as competitive as I am, I’m motivated if I’m able to win.”
What does it mean that you’ve spent your entire career at Joe Gibbs Racing?
“A lot. They’re the ones that went out on a limb and hired me when I had nothing. They took a chance on me and JD (Gibbs) obviously believed in me quite a bit. So yeah, you want to pay back that loyalty to the family that gave you that start and you know, it’ll be well over 20 years that I’ll be with them and couldn’t imagine racing for any other organization, much less family.”
How are you able to continue to improve this late in your career?
“I think, also, one of the deciding factors is that I have my body in a good place. My back is not bothering me as much as it was a few years ago. And so, a lot of it is can you physically hold up. So, I’ll treat the next two years just like I’d be treating my rookie season or the year after. I’ve never waned from making sure I’m doing my job to the best of my ability and work ethic will never change.”
Do you think drivers hit their peaks at younger ages in this day and age?
“I would say drivers peak between 25-30 for what I believe is to be true in this day and age. A lot of that has changed because of the technology, because of the information. You see that with young golfers, right? Kids that are 14-years-old are shooting 65. It’s just more information, more training, smarter training. It’s the same in racing and I think that was probably true back then where you know you had to get more seat time and now these drivers have many laps in simulation. Back when I was doing this, you couldn’t get in any kind of actual car until 16. Now it’s like 12 or 13, so everything is moved up and with the new technology of training. Nowadays, I just feel like that number (pause), you should be able to be at your craft (pause). Now, as you continue to get more and more experience, your craft will continue to get better. But then, I think that there is just some sort of switchover point where then your abilities not as good. It’s different for everyone. Certainly, I think that in NASCAR, for what I’ve seen, lately 25-30 it seems like a really good spot.”
Why specifically a two-year extension?
“For for me, it’s all I feel comfortable with. Three years? Who knows what can happen three years from now, so I just want to make sure that I get them (Joe Gibbs Racing) proper time and make sure I commit to them for not one year, multiple years. Let them try to build continue to build the program. No particular reason other than, if I was 26, I would take 10 years, but I just I want to make sure that I’m still at my peak form in my final year. That could be tailing off for three years, so I don’t want that.”
As a team owner, are you guys happy with the where the 2026 schedule is going?
“It’s certainly important from the team-owner side (racing in big U.S. markets). At Chicago, it was a big activation place for 23XI Racing in particular. We had a lot of a lot of our major sponsors that were needed big activation at that track. So certainly, the locations matter when it comes to where we go, but I also understand the challenges of bringing race tracks to those particular cities that you talked about. It’s a tough balance.”
Do you have any ideas for how the In-Season Challenge could evolve?
“Certainly, paying for advancing (in each round), I think you probably get more buy in from drivers if they’re financially motivated to beat this one person. I know a lot of people kind of played it off this year, everyone knew about, everyone did care about it. So yeah, I mean that’s always a factor, but then you have to create a bigger pool of money there. Then, you still need to make it big for the winner but certainly feel like it was all implemented fairly well this year. Just adjust the tracks, maybe adjust the payout like you talked about as you advance you continue to get a higher payout, and then you move from there.”
How special would getting a win at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway be for you?
“Yeah, it’s tough to say what it would mean until it actually happens. Adding another Crown Jewel would be big, and then to have had them all swept to where we’ve done it all. I mean certainly the names are very prestigious on that list and so, it would certainly mean a lot to me. It would just be another you know feather in the cap. I don’t know what else it would bring to me other than that just little prestige, but certainly, we’ve come close. I mean we were actually just as close on that road course as we were on the oval, although I don’t know you could argue whether that was an actual Crown Jewel or not. Yeah, highly motivated just need things to go our way once.”
Have you been studying how Kyle Larson was able to win this race last season?
“Well, it’s so hard because everyone in front of them (No. 5) had to save fuel, so we were all running half throttle down the straightaway, allowing these big runs to look bigger than they actually were. So, if everyone’s on full throttle there, most of those passes probably don’t happen. I think he’s good enough to where some of them do happen just naturally, but again, everyone was on a fuel save mode, so it’s just it’s so hard to really learn much from it given the circumstances, but certainly (was) very impressive.”
Is there an age where you think you’ll want to retire?
I don’t know, I like to just see kind of where I’m at two years from right now. Just kind of where’s the team at, what’s their Plan B? Where are they at with that? And then just see how competitive I am, how good do I feel, how bad do I want. All those things are just big factors in it, but I just I want the ability to know I can win my last race. That’s going to be the deciding factor. I’m not going to wait until I start to head downward and then retire. I don’t want to go through a whole year. I understand if it just happens naturally in the second half of the final year, then it just happens, but I don’t want to have to go through another season (pause) if I’m starting to tail off the end of next year, I’ll just retire. I could retire whenever I want to retire, so I think that I’m just going to see how things go.”
If you reach 60 wins, is there a goal after that?
“I’d love to get 60 this year. That would put me in a really good spot over the next couple of years and then get into the 60s where I think that could hold up for quite some time until someone young comes in and moves up the list. It’s going to continue to get harder and harder. The field gets closer and closer, and the wins are going to get more spread out. So, we’re not in the era of three competitive cars and four competitive drivers. Wins are always going to get more spread out now than what they were back in the 1960s and 1970s, in those days. I’d like to firmly get in there, and then make people chase it from that from that point on.”
When you do retire, what are some things you’d like to focus on or do in retirement?
“I think I just need to see what retirement is like, whether I’m bored or not. I just don’t see myself as someone that is able to go from this crazy world and life that I live with all these things to then just shutting it down to zero. So, I think I need to just feel those first few months out. Obviously, feel like with 23XI (Racing), there’s an opportunity there to be winners of the sport long after I’m done driving. That will take up more time, I’ll give more time to that. But then beyond that, I don’t know. I’ll figure out how much golf I could play and how many fish I can catch.”
What are you looking forward to in returning to Iowa next weekend?
“That was interesting because that track is like a short track, and we were not good. Now, I had some health issues. I was not feeling well to start that race and we went straight to the back. I think we got lapped. I felt a little better after halfway, and we got back on the lead lap. Actually, got to top five and then crashed. Not really sure about that track. It’s one of the ones that I’m a little uneasy about kind of where we are but I’m sure year-over-year, taking the notes that we learned from last year. I was supposed to do the Iowa test this year, (but) didn’t obviously because of (the birth of son) Jameson, so missed out on all my tests this year. Hope I go there and run well. Should, anyway.”
What other achievements would you like to have before you retire?
“Just more Crown Jewels. I don’t know exactly how many I have now. Seven? So, if I can get (to) eight or nine, I don’t know if that changes much, but it certainly makes me feel a little better. You have to have goals, and those Crown Jewels will be one that you know we go to races like this (Brickyard 400), they’re going to talk about ones that people that have won here at this race track and won Crown Jewel events. I want to be high on the Crown Jewel list of winners. If I can get a couple more of those and again put myself well into the 60s (career wins), if not a bigger number, then (pause). if I get nothing else, truly, I’m going to be happy. I’ll be disappointed because you know, setting my goals now accordingly based off how things are going. But truthfully, I would be happy with just calling it and saying this is how many races I won, this is my winning percentage, this is how many Crown Jewels I have.”
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