Denny Hamlin explains confrontation between Austin Dillon and Kyle Larson at Watkins Glen

Denny Hamlin was as dumbfounded as the rest of the NASCAR community as it pertained to the incident between Kyle Larson and Austin Dillon on the last turn at Watkins Glen.

As the checkered flag waved, Larson and Dillon wrecked, and it seemed like there was some frustration being taken out. Larson dove into the final corner, and Dillon had nowhere to go. On his latest Actions Detrimental podcast, Hamlin tried to make sense of it.

“I mean, I watched the race back, and those (who) didn’t see Kyle Larson, I thought he had one of the best cars. He ran us down, but then kind of got stalled behind us, just like Ty [Gibbs] did. Everyone else who was behind us, pretty much. He was fast, and then he had a pit road penalty. He was, I’ve noticed Kyle gets ruffled really, really easily. Like when he gets hard on himself, like man, he made a mistake or whatever. He knows he had a shot to win, and like he’s just hard on himself,” explained Hamlin. “So then he gets in the back, and I can just imagine. I’ve been back there with him before, when we’ve both had penalties. He drives like a madman. He’s just wired differently in that sense. He’ll put it in places where I’m like, ‘Eh, okay.’

“So I saw the contact first from Austin Dillon, and I look at it and I’m like, ‘Damn AD, you missed the corner by a mile.’ Like, but it looked intentional. If you see you’re going to miss the corner, you would just go to the left, that way you wouldn’t just run directly into the back of them. So I’m like, ‘Well, it’s intentional,’ and he came from a long way back. He was pretty pissed about something.”

Continuing, Hamlin revealed he spoke to Dillon about the incident, to get his side of the story before anything, and provided a clearer picture on what might’ve gone down.

“So I asked AD what it was about, because I told him, ‘Hey, I’m going to have to comment on this,’ you know, ‘Tell me, what did I not see. What did TV not show?’ He said, ‘Well, when we were back there, Kyle was — nobody was passing anyone.’ He’s like, ‘Alright, I was running behind the same damn cars the whole race.’ You know I get it, everyone’s frustrated because you think you’re faster than the car in-front of you. Can’t pass them. Everyone’s just frustrated. But at this point in the race, the race is over. You’re not winning. You’re not contending for really even a top-fifteen. You’ve got to just get to the checkered, and Kyle was trying to make up spots. … Who knows the motivation, right? He’s going to try and get the best finish he possibly can, no matter what race. He’s just that kind of competitor,” added the NASCAR vet. “But in the end … it’s kind of race management. … So AD said that he jammed it in on him in the bus stop, really late one time. Because AD was being held up by somebody else. Austin said, ‘Had I not completely screwed myself to give him room for that crazy dive-bomb, we would’ve both been wrecked.’ And he said to me that Kyle apologized for that move. He’s like, ‘Yeah, it was late, and I didn’t,’ you know. Understand.

“So then I guess what happened is AD said he didn’t get out of the bus stop well, and Kyle was right on him on the entry, I believe it was, and he kind of knocked him up the race track. So he moved him up the race track, and then got around him and passed him. So AD was pissed off about it.”