Denny Hamlin adopts new dog after finding stray puppy in St. Louis

Denny Hamlin did not win the Enjoy Illinois 300 in St. Louis on Sunday, but he did bring home a new puppy. On his Actions Detrimental podcast, Hamlin revealed he adopted a dog named Lulu.

“She’s six to seven weeks so she’s very, very young,” Hamlin said. “The park rangers found her by the river.”

Hamlin’s daughter Taylor then told the story of how the family adopted the dog. She said that were at the The Gateway Arch in St. Louis and they were watching a movie. Hamlin decided to go home while the rest of the family stayed. As they were taking a picture, a park ranger walked by and had the puppy. The park ranger said the puppy wasn’t mine and told the family they could hold her. The puppy was a stray, and the park ranger was going to take her to the pound, Hamlin’s family asked if they could adopt her. While the family has the dog now, Hamlin is not sure if Lulu will be a permanent member of the family.

“This is short-term happiness and a long-term pain in the a**,” Hamlin explained. And when it comes to his kids taking care of the dog, Hamlin said, “They’re not going to do it. They don’t ever pick up after themselves. They are not going to take care of this dog.” Hamlin added, “We’ll figure this out for sure.”

Denny Hamlin shares photo of adopted puppy

Over the weekend, Hamlin went to Instagram to share a picture of the puppy with his two daughters. In the caption, Hamlin wrote, “Found by the river. If this is your dog DM me with a pic of this pup and we will get it returned.”

  
 
 
 
 
 
 
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As mentioned earlier, Hamlin did not win the race at Gateway, but he had a strong showing as he finished second behind Austin Cindric. On the podcast, Hamlin talked about how the victory found Cindric.

“This is the definition of if you just run in the top five wins will find you,” Hamlin said. “This one where the win found him, but they did a great job of qualifying well and putting themselves in a position to be in the top five all day long.

“He also had to cut his way through the pack at times. When the field did flip that one stage, he had to restart and had to go by guys. It’s not like it was just kinda easy sailing the whole time.”