Toyota GAZOO Racing – Bubba Wallace
NASCAR Cup Series Quotes
CONCORD, N.C. (October 4, 2025) – 23XI Racing driver Bubba Wallace was made available to the media on Saturday prior to practice for the NASCAR Cup Series race at Charlotte Motor Speedway ROVAL.
BUBBA WALLACE, No. 23 Leidos Toyota Camry XSE, 23XI Racing
How was the competition meeting this week?
“Look it was definitely a somber week for sure, and I hate that it got to this point – the lingering effect, but Denny (Hamlin) and I just talked 30 minutes ago. It was a good, heart-to-heart conversation. It came from a place of peace. It went better than I thought it would. He shared his side of things, and I shared mine and we had common ground. I told him – and it was kind of funny – I kind of sent him on a detour when I said, you can go first, and then five seconds in I said, just so you know, I’m not mad about getting fenced going for the win – and his eyes were like, and he was like I need a second to reposition where I’m going to go. Just so we are all clear on that – that is not going to be the last time where I’m battling for a win and it doesn’t go our way in some fashion, whether that is Denny or anybody in the field. I’ll be a little gracious here and say 95 percent of the people on this side of the catchfence look at that move as, oof, that’s it. The other five percent, whether they are buddies or they don’t care, and they see the other side of it. I don’t fault Denny Hamlin for racing for a win, racing for his team, and his sponsors. I get the question a lot – what is it like racing Denny, on the race track, no offense to him, but I could give two shits because he is a competitor, and he has labeled it that way. That was two competitors going for a win, and so as much so as it didn’t work out, I have to respect that. I think Dale (Earnhardt, Jr.) said it – I have every right to be pissed off about it. My biggest thing was Toyota didn’t win, and before I left my motorhome after the race, I texted the Toyota reps apologizing that we didn’t win. We had five in the top-five to take the green flag on the last restart, and none of us won. I just told Chase (Elliott) – we alley oop’d that for him, he appreciated it. It was all of the people that got effected – that is where my frustration came from, because I felt like I was stepping up for them, so while the conversation went really well – the pain is still there a little bit, but it definitely eased it. So I definitely appreciate Denny’s comments, never want him to back down in any scenario, but I didn’t get the chance to see the rest of the corner, and so yeah, that sucks.”
Is the pain because you didn’t win or it may affect you having a shot to run for the title?
“Both. I don’t expect – I’m not an owner and a driver. I don’t know what the thought process is. It is easy to sit there and Monday quarterback it, or in this case Saturday quarterback it. I’m sure it’s a difficult thing to juggle. It’s really good if I get 60 wins, and it is really good that I advance myself in the Playoffs, but man, it’s also really good if the car I own gets locked into the next round. There is a lot of money on the line – there is a lot of layers to all of that. You don’t think about that – I would assume – in the moment. Win and you’ve got to do what you’ve got to do. That is what we’ve always done since we were kids – figure it out, and you’ve got to do what you’ve got to do to win races. Some are more respectful than others, and you’ve just got to deal with it. You’ve got to respect that and accept it and move on.”
What is the mood in the shop right now?
“I would say none of us have – and this can be, I don’t want to say naive to the fact – but we don’t go there and talk about December 1st. It is our jobs; it is our livelihoods to give it everything we’ve got for the race that is ahead of us. That sounds like a very cliché answer, but I could care less. I’ve got five races left to go out and fight for a championship, and I set that tone from the beginning of the year. We’ve got to work out tails off to make it count each and every week. With everything going on in the background, I’ve encouraged my guys to stay focused on that – so I can’t answer your question and give you any insight to that, nor would if it was the case, but I genuinely don’t feel that. Now if Sunday was December 1st – mood was pretty down, and I hate that for my team, but it is a new weekend. Fresh opportunity in front of us. It is time to go focus on that.”
How much attention do you pay attention to the lawsuit?
“I don’t. I focus on the things that I can control and let everything else sit on the background. Didn’t even know anything went on last night, so that just shows you, I guess, how out of tune I am, but focused, for me, on the more important things.”
Why is the frustration that Toyota didn’t win?
“You turn left, and you go from the bottom. Simple as that. A lot of people want to relate that move to my move to CBell (Christopher Bell). CBell got to see the other side of the corner, and I was on the bottom to start the corner and drifted up. That was the thing. I texted CBell before I left the bus. I said, man, my full intentions were to use the air. That is still one thing that we can go back to when (Kyle) Larson fenced me at Vegas. We all know that moment. He didn’t touch me – I don’t think, it was more so his air put me in the fence. There is a fine line, obviously, of just forcing someone to lift, but also putting someone in the fence. I texted CBell after the race and said my full intentions were to make you lift, not put you in the fence, and I apologized for that. He took it, I guess, as best as he could, but I reached out immediately because I saw the replay after the fact, and was like damn, I did not want that, but I allowed him – I don’t know how long it takes you to get from turn three to turn four, a couple of seconds, I allowed him to see that. Just the way it was handled after the fact was a frustration too.”
How are you and your team better than you were a year ago?
“I’ve joked around since Indy that I don’t care, and for the longest time I was always racing for job security, no matter how long you are signed, I go back to COTA, when I crashed out, third race of the season, I said I needed to be replaced because I was always just chasing the results and wasn’t living up to expectations for self, and I’m sure the expectations for the team. I was just kind of being a realistic, pessimistic – like I’m not doing the job right, but Indy allowed me to enjoy that job that I did, and also replay that – you didn’t care in that moment. You raced because you loved it. I think that has been the biggest shift. Everyone just supporting that and showing up and having fun. It has been fun being on the race track. Everybody has told me that the start of Kansas last Sunday – they like to say I give up, I never give up, so that is BS when you hear that, but the outcome would have been different. Bubba Wallace wouldn’t be fighting for the win a year ago if his Kansas race started out like that. I think it is just legit, letting the little stuff go and allowing yourself as chance to breathe and looking at things differently. That has produced a lot of the results.”
Does it add another layer to that when Denny just goes on the whole next day and has a graphic that says I won’t apologize? Does the tension and awkwardness just stem from the uniqueness of the situation?
“Yeah, you kind of hit it right there on the head. It was just the way it was kind of handled behind the scenes just kept going, kept adding fuel to the fire and I hate that it got to that point, and I expressed my displeasure to Denny (Hamlin) today, and he totally respected that. I’m a guy that we have confrontation, and it is not settled – like it is lingering, and now I’m in this spot where I’m 25, 26 points out. I expressed to him, that what you need from your driver is to be at 110 percent focused on what to do, how to execute, and how to go out there and beat SVG (Shane van Gisbergen) – I had a dark cloud over my mind all week long, man, it’s not fair to my team. I expressed that, he told respected that, and frankly the conversation allows him to see things from a different perspective. Denny usually doesn’t do that but allowed him to have that opportunity. As much as I wanted to come in here and MF the guy, the competitor Denny, the conversation went better than expected and you feel lighter on your feet. There is a transition period that you have to go through, and it sucks that it is happening on Saturday.”
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