Denny Hamlin sends warning shot to NASCAR, fellow drivers ahead of Pocono
Denny Hamlin has a message for his fellow NASCAR drivers as they get ready for the Pocono Cup Series race. At the end of the latest episode of the Actions Detrimental podcast, Hamlin teased making a big run at the next two races.
“Going to Pocono, there’s no wet weather tires at Poncono, and there’s no wet weather tires coming at Indy,” Hamlin said. These next two weeks, it’s on.”
The last few weeks have been a struggle for Hamlin who has already won three races this year. On Sunday, the 43-year-old finished 30th at the Chicago Street Race and has not finished higher than 24th in four of his last five races. Before that, Hamlin earned top-five finishes in five consecutive races, including a win at Dover.
Hamlin has had his share of success at Pocono. Since 2006, the three-time Daytona 500 champion has won at the track seven times including last year. He holds the NASCAR record for the most wins at Pocono.
The NASCAR Cup Series is returning to Indianapolis Motor Speedway for the first time since 2020. Hamlin has competed there 15 times and has yet to earn a victory. He has earned three P3 finishes at Indianapolis with the last being in 2018.
Denny Hamlin had a rough time at the Chicago Street Race
Hamlin would love nothing more than to get back on track and earned his fourth victory of the season this upcoming weekend. On the podcast, Hamlin talked about how he could not get anything going and nearly ruining Ricky Stenhouse Jr.‘s day.
“It’s way out of my element,” Hamlin said. “I can’t find the limit on corner breaking, on entry. The minute I tried to push it is when you saw me turn around backwards in Turn 6, and took — nearly just wiped the No. 47 just clean out. I looked at his car after we got done, after we got back straight again, and the left side of his bumper was bent down like, three inches or something.
“It was big, and I’m like, ‘Oh God, just crushed his race.’ He just talked to me in my — I was in my car, during one of the rain delays, well the biggest rain delay — kind of in the middle of the race there. He was like, ‘So, these conditions, where do you break? On-line, off-line?’ I’m like, ‘I don’t know,’ and then he texted me after the race and said, ‘I guess you should’ve braked off-line.’ So, I’m glad he got a good finish, and I didn’t completely ruin the No. 47’s day. But it all worked out in the end.”
On3’s Steve Samra contributed to this story.