TOYOTA RACING – Denny Hamlin
NASCAR Cup Series Quotes

DARLINGTON, SC (March 21, 2026) – Joe Gibbs Racing driver Denny Hamlin was made available to the media on Saturday prior to the NASCAR Cup Series race from Darlington Raceway.

DENNY HAMLIN, No. 11 Sport Clips Haircuts Toyota Camry XSE, Joe Gibbs Racing

Have you noticed any former teammates racing you harder after they leave their organization?

“I think there’s always going to be animosity from anyone that gets let go from their position. That’s human nature. I don’t think anyone – you don’t have to be a good person or a bad person to have that sort of feeling. Truthfully, my relationship with my teammates always got better when we were no longer teammates. (laughter) I mean, that’s just factual. We always were closer after their time was up. So, I don’t know. Different for everyone, but certainly you can’t stop human nature.”

Have you ever thought about getting to Dale Earnhardt’s number or Kyle Busch’s win number or is that in pie in the sky?

“I think it’s pie in the sky, realistically, I think that, you know, given the runway, Kyle’s (Busch) career – he’s still got more years to go than I will. He’s capable of running and winning long after I’m gone. I think I’m kind of where I’m at, and where I think I will be, but you just never know. I mean, each win stacks up and, you know, 50 was a goal at one point. So, you just keep moving, keep moving the bar as far as you can. I think that I’ve certainly got more wins than what I would have imagined. It’s just now can we, can we get the big prizes at the end of the year? That’s the only goal left to have other than the Brickyard is certainly one that still is mindful of me personally, of where I’m at.”

Has the start of the season impacted you possibly wanting to go past 2027?

“I’m not really sure. I think that I’ve given Gibbs enough of a heads up that they’re working on the plans for beyond. So as long as those all go as planned, I would, I still assume that the end of ‘27 is it. I just don’t want to go to my last half of the year or year just like, can’t wait to get out. If I could end on notes like we have like seasons like this one is starting, then that would be a successful last year for me.”

Do you want to have a farewell tour?

“No, no, I’m good on that.”

Is this going to be your last contract?

“Well, I mean, things always change. You just never know, but it’s what I would like, but again, I don’t know all the moving parts and pieces beyond what happens between now and bout 20 months from now. So, you just don’t know, but I thought that was a good enough timeline and enough heads up that, that they could make plans.”

How did you get to the thought where you thought 67 would be potentially the final win total?

“Just averages over the years. If you average the last 10 years or something like that, it’s about 3.5 wins a year. That puts me right around that number. That’s assuming that I don’t wake up in 2027 and have a declining skill set. That’s why it’s still a goal. It’s not the pie in the sky, but it’s still going to take some work to do.”

Have you had any issues with any teammates over the years and how did you handle that?

“None of them. I mean, really, none of them. I mean, I think, now I think about it, me and Joey (Logano) is the one that was better with than what it was without, but still it doesn’t mean I don’t respect them. I never really had any long standing animosity towards any teammates. I think everyone had been really, really fair to me over the course of my career, and again, a lot of it is, I really had a lot of experienced teammates, guys that were older than me and more experienced, and guys that won a lot of races, so I really respected a ton. So, no, not really. I can truthfully say that I’ve never had any issues long term with any of them.”

How did your background in late models help you with managing tires here at Darlington?

“Late models is low horsepower, short tracks. It’s easy and hard off. That’s just the general mindset when it comes to these types of racetracks that wear tires out is easy on corner entry, hard on a corner exit, and you just take that philosophy to all these tracks that we wear tires on, it typically works really well. I just was really lucky early in my career to get a test here. I watched Brent Crews run his very first couple laps in the simulator at Darlington, and I just watched him just like pound the wall off a turn two, like lap after lap after lap (laughter), and that’s just that’s exactly what I was doing, and only it was real life. I didn’t have the virtual option back then, and so just kind of watching him and saying here’s where you need to be at this point of the corner and here’s your lift point typically. I actually got in the O’Reilly simulator and ran some laps kind of as a bogey lap for him. It was just, I was very lucky to be able to be at a test here with Tony Stewart when he was here in a Cup car, and I got to come here in an O’Reilly car, and just run laps and learn from him, and after eventually wearing the sheet metal off the right side and having nothing left but the 4 by 4 that they put in the door. I figured out how to get around here, and at that point, I latched onto the track.”

About Toyota

Toyota (NYSE:TM) has been a part of the cultural fabric in the U.S. for nearly 70 years, and is committed to advancing sustainable, next-generation mobility through our Toyota and Lexus brands, plus our nearly 1,500 dealerships.

Toyota directly employs nearly 48,000 people in the U.S. who have contributed to the design, engineering, and assembly of more than 35 million cars and trucks at our 11 manufacturing plants. In 2025, Toyota’s plant in North Carolina began to assemble automotive batteries for electrified vehicles.

For more information about Toyota, visit www.ToyotaNewsroom.com.

TOYOTA RACING – Chase Briscoe
NASCAR Cup Series Quotes

DARLINGTON, SC (March 21, 2026) – Joe Gibbs Racing driver Chase Briscoe was made available to the media on Saturday prior to the NASCAR Cup Series race from Darlington Raceway.

CHASE BRISCOE, No. 19 Free Bird Southern Spring Water Toyota Camry XSE, Joe Gibbs Racing

What changes do you think we will see in tomorrow’s race?

“I mean, I don’t know what was wrong with the package here at Darlington before (laughter). I mean, I think it’ll be good. No matter what package you come to Darlington with, you’re going to slip and slide around, and that’s just going tobe amplified now. So, I think you’re going to have more guys that are kind of coming and going throughout the field. I think there’s going to be a bigger discrepancy now in short run versus long run guys. I think this is the one race is probably more wide open than any other, just because it’s the first time we’re doing it. Nobody has a notebook on anything right now where as we go throughout the year, with Dover and Darlington 2 and all these things, teams are just going to start getting better and better and understanding what we need, where right now nobody has a clue what this thing’s going to do. So, yeah, I’m excited for this weekend. I’m always excited to come to Darlington, but certainly the more power, slipping, sliding around. It’s going be a lot of fun.”

What did you think about this track when you started coming here?

“Honestly, I loved this place from the first laps I ran around it. I don’t know, just something clicked right away. I still had a lot to learn my first time coming here, but the style of racing here reminded me so much of Sprint Car racing where you’re constantly changing what you were doing. You’re always searching and trying to find that little bit more grip, and you go to some of these racetracks and you’re pretty repetitive. Like you just do the same thing, time in, time out. We’re here – you don’t ever run two laps the same. I mean, every lap, your car is just changing so much, so you’re always adapting, and that’s what I kind of loved about this place from the get go and then you just added the fact that you’re sliding all over the place. Yeah, really from the first time I came here, I was like, man, this is one of my favorite places, and then as the success came in, it obviously got closer and closer to the top. So yeah, I’ve always loved Darlington. It’s been a very influential place in my career and really my life in general.”

How would 750 horsepower affect the mile-and-a-half package?

“I don’t know. I could see it going either way. If you start going faster, it probably makes the field even more spread out, I feel like. Just the difference in the top teams and the bottom teams are going to be even more extreme. So maybe it just is one of those things where the rich kind of get richer, where right now, like we are not underpowered, but like we’re all relatively the same speed for the most part, right? At least from 1st to 30th and in qualifying is only a couple tenths where I think as you add more power, like the setups, everything is just going to become more and more important. So, I don’t I don’t know. I could see it going either way. I think it could make it maybe a little bit better. Maybe it makes it worse. So, yeah, I’m obviously not against it. I mean, it’s way more fun for any of us to go drive a 900 horsepower car versus a 200 horsepower car, right? You always want more, but on the mile-and-a-halves, I don’t know what it would do, to be honest with you. I think some tracks, we could definitely use it, but there’s other tracks where maybe the product’s as good as it’s going get right now. So yeah, I don’t know which way it would go if I’m being honest.”

How are you gauging this weekend going in balancing confidence versus being cautious?

“I feel like this is one of those tracks where typically things that work, like no matter the O’Reilly car, truck, like you can still find some speed doing it, but I wouldn’t say I’m like overly confident coming into this weekend just because so much has changed. I think it could be a totally different style of racing now. I mean, just even in a simulator, it drives nothing like what he used to drive like. So I think it’s hard to come into this one specifically and be like, oh yeah, our stuff’s going to be really, really good. I’m hopeful that it’s good, but you don’t really know until we go out here and practice. So yeah, hopefully, our team will hit it right. I do think it’s going to be one of those races where only a handful of teams are really going to hit it and have a huge advantage. So yeah, it’ll be interesting.”

Will you know more after practice or do you have to get into the race? What kind of driver do you think will excel in this type of race?

“Certainly going out in practice, you’re going to at least have a better idea of what to expect. You can validate some of your simulation. I mean, you’re still not going to have the full picture, but I do think it gives you at least somewhat in the ballpark of kind of what you need to do. I don’t know. I think that it’s such an unknown right now with what this thing is going to drive like that nobody really knows, but I would think certainly the guys that are good on the long run are good when the car is slipping and sliding around, those would be the guys I would think would be good just because I think that’s how the cars are going to drive. So, it will be interesting to see. We could all go out here and practice it as the complete opposite of what we think is going to be. That’s the exciting thing, I think, for all of us.”

How do you prepare for a race like this?

“I mean really, just the sim. That it. The video, like, you can go back and look at it, but it’s going be so different, right? Even qualifying what we’ve done here in the past, you just have so much less down for, so much more horse power that. Certain little tendencies in qualifying will still work, but just what was successful last time isn’t going to work this time. So, it’s hard whenever you’re trying to study for races like this. Tonight will be one where you’re definitely going to go and look at a lot of stuff, just trying to figure out what other guys are doing, but yeah, really just a simulator. Even that, like, that’s what I was saying earlier, it could be way off. You just don’t know until we get here. I would say this is going to be one of the more exciting practice sessions, at least for myself, just because of the unknowns, and then qualifying is going be a lot of fun too, just because it’s going kind of be, you know, who can figure it out? I’m looking forward to that.”

Do you think we will see more Darlington stripes with this new package?

“I think you’re going to see a lot more of it. It is just going to be easier. The harder the car is to drive, the easier it is to get the fence, and typically, the less downforce you have, the more advantageous it is to start running closer and closer and closer to the wall just because that becomes your grip. Look we could race rental cars around here and we’re probably going to put it in the fence eventually, but when you add just all the added power and less downforce, I think it’s certainly going to be one of those races where a lot of guys are just making mistakes and getting into the fence.”

About Toyota

Toyota (NYSE:TM) has been a part of the cultural fabric in the U.S. for nearly 70 years, and is committed to advancing sustainable, next-generation mobility through our Toyota and Lexus brands, plus our nearly 1,500 dealerships.

Toyota directly employs nearly 48,000 people in the U.S. who have contributed to the design, engineering, and assembly of more than 35 million cars and trucks at our 11 manufacturing plants. In 2025, Toyota’s plant in North Carolina began to assemble automotive batteries for electrified vehicles.

For more information about Toyota, visit www.ToyotaNewsroom.com.

TOYOTA RACING – Christopher Bell
NASCAR Cup Series Quotes

DARLINGTON, SC (March 21, 2026) – Joe Gibbs Racing driver Christopher Bell was made available to the media on Saturday prior to the NASCAR Cup Series race from Darlington Raceway.

CHRISTOPHER BELL, No. 20 DEWALT Toyota Camry XSE, Joe Gibbs Racing

No. 19 Sport Clips Haircuts Toyota GR Supra, Joe Gibbs Racing

When drivers change teams, do you think drivers race their former teammates any differently?

“I don’t think so. I’m honestly trying to think back to, even whenever I came into the 20 car, and Erik Jones went to the 43. I thought Erik raced me really respectfully. I haven’t noticed that and I didn’t get to see the incident or I wasn’t around Daniel (Suarez) or Ross (Chastain) at all last week. So, yeah, I don’t have anything for you there.”

Are there any races where it is more difficult to run double-duty or triple-duty?

“Yeah, I mean, there’s definitely certain tracks that are a lot more physical than others. The physical tracks on the schedule would be Dover, even Bristol, but Darlington, it is not too bad. You have some decent straightaways to get some rest. The speeds are down; the G-forces are down. The biggest thing about Darlington is it’s just mentally taxing. Like you have to be mentally switched on the entire time because you get no off laps. You’re right up against the wall and any sort of mistakes are going to damage your car and likely jeopardize your potential to run well. I think most of us don’t really get the opportunity to pick where we run double, and triple duty. It’s more so about the teams and where they want you to drive at. I’ve been doing the O’Reilly Series race here for a number of years now with Sport Clips, and then it came together with Pristine Auction to do the truck race as well. It’s more so on the team’s deciding where I’m going to run or where the drivers are going to run compared to the drivers deciding where they want to do it at.”

What makes the Cup practice so important this weekend?

“Yeah, well, certainly learning from that group A. It’s nice that we’re in group B, so we get to watch. So, we’ll have a good idea of what the tire degradation is going be and how slick it is and how different the cars drive. So all of us are going to be tuned in to that group A for sure, all the group B drivers and teams are going to be glued to those monitors, watching, see what the guys are struggling with, what the tire deg is, what the balance migration is, and then making adjustments on their cars for the group B session. So, once you get on track, you kind of go to focusing on, on what you’re doing in that moment and even if it does go a certain direction, really loose or really tight, or a lot of, a lot of tire deg, a little tire deg – I don’t think it’s going to be a little tire deg – but, it’s, yeah, watching group A is going to be a huge, huge part of practice and hitting your adjustments because this is so foreign. The last time that we had a rules package change like this, we had an open practice at Phoenix, I think. So, it’s going to be tremendously different than what we’ve had, and I would expect there to be a lot of field spread between the best cars and the worst cars.”

Do you feel like tomorrow’s race will live up to the hype?

“The potential to crash by yourself is going to be much greater than what we’ve had in previous Darlington races, but honestly, thinking back to it, like the harder that we make the cars to drive, it seems like everybody becomes more heightened and focused on driving their car well and we typically see less crashes. I don’t know that it’s going to be a crash fest, but, yeah, I think everybody at this point is just speculating. Like nobody truly knows what’s going to happen. Whenever we get out there with, you know, this aero package and upped horsepower. Even after the practice session, we’ll know a little bit of what the tire deg is and how the cars drive, but we won’t know how they race, and I think that’s where hopefully we make the biggest gains is even if the cars drive differently, hopefully they drive better in traffic. We’re able to pass better and ultimately, we see a better race because of that, and, with the Phoenix being the higher horsepower stuff, it seemed like we could pass tremendously better. I would expect Darlington to be a place where we can pass a lot easier too.”

Is there a point of the season where you feel like you need to be in the top three or you will begin to panic?

“Definitely not before the reset. The Chase reset is what we’re all focused on is trying to get that best seeding position going into the Chase. Someone could run away with the regular season and then get bumped back down closer to the field at the Chase, or it could be a really tight points battle and then they could get an advantage at the Chase reset. So, right now, it’s definitely way too early to be talking about the runaway stuff. I think that Chase reset could go either way. It could give the leader an advantage and more of a buffer or you could bring him back closer to us. So, for us and the 20 team, I think we’ve focused on just trying to be in that top 5 in the regular season standings, at one time, I didn’t think we were ever going to get there after the first two races being that far back, but the points have worked out. We’ve run really well in the stages and the guys that are winning races are able to make up a lot of positions and a lot of points with those added points to the win. So, yeah, if we can start winning races, who knows, maybe the regular season championship isn’t out of out of the hunt, but right now we’re right where we want to be, and, we feel like we’re in great contention still for the championship.”

Has there been a former teammate that you didn’t get along with and how did you handle that situation?

“Yeah, fortunately, I haven’t ever been in that position. I’ve certainly had run-ins with competitors, but my style is if you have a confrontation, like just have a conversation about it and be able to move, move past it, put it behind you. A lot of the people that I’ve had run-ins with or I think right now, all of the people that I’ve had run-ins with, like I’m on pretty good standings with all of them. I feel like I’m in a pretty good spot right now.”

Do you keep a mental tally or write something down on people that you’ve had run-ins throughout the years?

“No, I mean, you certainly, I think if someone wrongs you enough, then you understand that going into the next time that you’re around them, but like I said, if I make a mistake and get into somebody, I’m going to reach out to them and apologize and have a conversation with them and let them know, however they take it, at least they know that I wasn’t willfully trying to take them out of the event. If it’s something that’s not bad at all, if you don’t even think about it whenever you’re on track, but then, the more it is, the more that you think about it whenever you’re on track.”

Is there anything you looked at after Las Vegas after your disappointment with your performance?

“I don’t think that anything that happened at Las Vegas will repeat at Darlington because the tracks race very differently, but certainly going back and learning from what transpired at Las Vegas and just understanding that next time that we go to that style of track, which will be more like a Kansas, and knowing how I didn’t get control of the race. I restarted on the front several times and feel like my race would have looked a lot different had I been able to get control of the event and get out in clean air and lead the race. When you’re side by side, whoever breaks that bubble and gets out front will lead a bunch of laps and look like the best car for a period of time, and unfortunately for me, I never won the starts and never won the restarts, so we never got control of the race. Certainly trying to go back and look at the events that transpired, all of the moves, the side drafts – it really is a side drafting game, so understanding that. I don’t think it’ll transpire to Darlington, but certainly the next mile and a half or normal intermediate.”

You did a great job with your commentating in Las Vegas. Would you like to be in the High Limit booth more often?

“Wow, thank you. Yeah, I enjoyed it. I don’t know when the next time I’ll get that opportunity, but yeah, I certainly enjoyed it.”

How do you manage tires here?

“We’ll certainly learn more about the strategy piece whenever we get into practice and, like I mentioned before, nobody has any idea, it’s all speculation on what the tire degradation is going to be and what that means for the strategy on Sunday. But, how do you save tires? I don’t know. I didn’t do it very well last night. That was my Achilles heel so hopefully I can save tires better today and tomorrow. I’m still looking for that magic answer if anyone else has it.”

What has been working this year with you leading so many laps?

“Well, that was a big thing that we focused on in the off season was getting back to leading laps. A lot of the stats last year mirrored my previous seasons, except for that laps led column, and that’s a really, really important piece because it shows car potential. It shows speed. We did well at the beginning of the year last year, and then we tapered off, mid-season, and we still got great finishes, but we weren’t able to lead the races and show that we had the best car because we didn’t have the best car. So, certainly this year, we’ve been off to a great start, to go to Phoenix and Vegas and have the races that we did, makes me super excited about the potential of our group, and I feel like we’re performing better now than what we did at the end of 2025, which is really good.”

Is it going to be more important to keep your car out of the fence this weekend?

“Yeah, these cars are so funny because they’re very robust in some ways, and they’re very fragile in, in other ways. Darlington is a place where you can hit the wall 10 times and get away with it, and then all of a sudden you just barely kiss the wall, and you get the wheel at the wrong angle, and you bend the tow link, and it ruins your day. I can promise you all of us are focused on staying off the wall. I would say that the O’Reilly cars are probably the most robust for getting against the wall because you don’t have that tow link and you can really lean on it and get away with it, but the Cup cars, you can get away with it all the way until you can’t. All of us are going hit the wall at some point and someone is going to have the unlucky touch of bending that tow link and then you’ve got a long day ahead of you. So yeah, they are very finicky race cars.”

How different of a race is it going to be?

“The last couple years since 2022, the race has become more and more and more predictable, as people understand, the Next Gen car. We’ve been on the same rules package, the same tire now for a long time at Darlington and the race has become very predictable where we know how it’s going to, how it’s going to turn out. I think this is a great change. I mentioned last week at Vegas that I would love to see this rules package implemented at all the racetracks. I think change is good for the sport. I think it’s good to keep the drivers and the crews on their toes and trying to see who can figure it out the quickest. So, I’m excited about it. I think that the race will look drastically different this time than last time.”

About Toyota

Toyota (NYSE:TM) has been a part of the cultural fabric in the U.S. for nearly 70 years, and is committed to advancing sustainable, next-generation mobility through our Toyota and Lexus brands, plus our nearly 1,500 dealerships.

Toyota directly employs nearly 48,000 people in the U.S. who have contributed to the design, engineering, and assembly of more than 35 million cars and trucks at our 11 manufacturing plants. In 2025, Toyota’s plant in North Carolina began to assemble automotive batteries for electrified vehicles.

For more information about Toyota, visit www.ToyotaNewsroom.com.