Denny Hamlin had 'beef' with NASCAR allowing cars to add fuel during New Hampshire rain delay

Denny Hamlin made some interesting points as it pertains to the drawbacks of the way NASCAR handled resuming the USA Today 301 at New Hampshire Motor Speedway on wet weather tires.

NASCAR allowed teams to change tires before resuming the race, but the decision was made to re-fuel the cars as well. Hamlin believes that ruined strategies that were being worked out throughout the first 200 laps of the race, and it’s something he would like to see avoided in the future.

“This is the whole beef I had a little bit, you had cars stay out like the No. 45 and you had a bunch of them take two tires or whatever, they were all short on fuel. And then, when we went back racing, they said, ‘Okay, we’re going to have a non-competitive pit stop,’ so they restarted the race over, when we went back wet-weather racing, and just said, ‘Alright, everybody come on. You’ve got to run these tires, and go fill up your gas tank.’ I was like, ‘What the hell?’ You know, that sucked, because we were good on fuel. Everyone around us was not, or most of them were not,” Hamlin explained, via the latest episode of his Actions Detrimental podcast. “So I didn’t — I think TV did a good job of explaining that. I think [Steve] Letarte and [Jeff] Burton were and of debating it on TV. ‘Yeah, if they do this, then here’s the unintended consequences, right?’ You just changed strategy that these teams have been doing for the entire first 200 laps. So, certainly there was some beef to be had to them saying, ‘We’re all going to mandate that you have to do this. Go ahead and fill your gas tank up.’ I think if people didn’t have fuel in the car, you shouldn’t let them put fuel in the car. Should’ve just (changed tires).

“I don’t agree with letting everyone fill up their tank when they were nearly out. The only reason they were up front is because they were nearly out!”

Instead of basically restarting the race, Hamlin would’ve rather seen whoever needed gas come down pit road at the first caution after going back to green, instead of being allowed a fresh start on wet weather tires.

“Allow people to take fuel under caution,” Hamlin responded, asked how to rectify the situation in the future. “The minute the first caution came out say, ‘Okay, if you want to pit now and put fuel in it, go ahead.’ But it definitely changed the complexion a little bit, when you allowed cars who were not going to make it on fuel, just now make it on fuel, because you reset the race.”

It certainly makes sense why Denny Hamlin and some other drivers who were prioritizing fuel at the time of the red flag to be a little annoyed at the way that was handled by NASCAR. It’s something decision-makers have to keep in mind the next time a similar situation arises, for sure.