“All the Drivers Are Gonna F**king Hate Me for This” – Denny Hamlin Opposes the Narrative Around New Changes as He Misses the ‘Best Racing He Had’

Denny Hamlin and NASCAR have been poles apart with their thought process more often than not. Being an outspoken personality, the Joe Gibbs Racing driver doesn’t always oblige with the governing body. The relationship only turned sourer recently when Hamlin was penalized for intentionally walling Ross Chastain at the Phoenix Raceway. After all that, he now has something to say that may not sit well with his fellow driver.

After spending almost two decades in the sport, Hamlin has tons of technical experience at his disposal. So now he has an unpopular opinion about how the new changes from NASCAR will have an impact.

Denny Hamlin gives his take on NASCAR’s new changes

Speaking on his podcast “Actions Detrimental” recently, the 42-year-old discussed the Phoenix race in detail. The new aerodynamic package introduced in Arizona is a new change for everyone involved in the sport. When asked how the constant changes from NASCAR of any help are, Hamlin gave a technical response to it.

He said, “We have gone from high downforce to low downforce, right? And everyone was panicking because alright back in 2017, we cut the spoilers off, we took all the downforce away in the bigger racetracks. Well, that unfortunately from a TV standpoint looks like sh*t because sometimes somebody hits the setup and they just kick everyone’s a**.

The Florida-born driver explained what, according to him, worked best for NASCAR. He said, “And what you look at is that probably the best racing we had at the mile and a half was the 550 [horsepower] package. They put enough downforce on the car to allow almost everyone able to run a lot of gas. So no brake, no nothing, you are running almost wide open.”

While Hamlin accepted that the new NASCAR change helps in making some progress with the Next Gen cars, he was quick to point out where did it go wrong as per his opinion. He even expects some hate to come his way from his fellow drivers for his comments.

He said, “I personally think while we did that test in December in Charlotte and all the drivers are gonna f**king hate me for this, but they took almost too much grip away and now it’s causing our field to get spread back out. So if I were President, I would say okay, we are gonna raise the maximum limiter up to 9300 [rpm].”

READ MORE – Denny Hamlin’s Transparent Initiative Amid $50K Scuffle Draws Admiration From Racing Fandom

Interestingly, Hamlin even went to sympathize with his friend Kevin Harvick after the Phoenix race on his podcast.

Hamlin heaps praises on the retiring Kevin Harvick

It is a pity to see Harvick retire after more than two decades of Cup Series racing. He came agonizingly close to winning the race in Arizona last Sunday. Seeing this, Hamlin couldn’t help but shower compliments on the Stewart-Haas Racing driver.

The three-time Daytona 500 winner said, “I’m so envious of Kevin Harvick because, he’s at his age, he is forty-six or forty-seven? forty-seven, man, he’s still good, I mean he’s so good, its, I, I understand the reason of stepping away but the guy has still got it, he’s carrying that SHR team.”

WATCH THIS STORY: “You Gotta Give What You Get” – Denny Hamlin Reveals His Gripe With Travis Scott and Drake

It is certainly great to see these veterans get along well. But the question is how Hamlin reacts after the penalties imposed on him by NASCAR? Will it affect his game plan for Atlanta? We’ll know better on Sunday.