Denny Hamlin Admits Tony Stewart’s Superiority Despite Outfoxing His Championship Pedigree

What’s important for a NASCAR driver to be claimed as one of the great? The easy answer is championship wins, right? But there’s also another important metric that helps us understand the driver’s impact on sport, which is the number of wins. And when you’re speaking about drivers with several wins, Denny Hamlin falls right into that category.

Another impressive fact is that the veteran driver has managed to adapt to the changes in racing. Recently, he joined Frank on his walk around the Martinsville Speedway and shared his excitement about getting level with Lee Petty in terms of Cup Series wins. Frank even pointed out how his numbers are impressive, sharing the example of Tony Stewart, who fell shy of hitting the mark of 50.

But Hamlin, in response, acknowledged Smoke as one of the greatest race car drivers. Suggesting that he doesn’t even come close to Stewart’s ability to compete and win in different motorsport disciplines.

Denny Hamlin speaks highly of Stewart’s talent as a race car driver

Only 15 NASCAR drivers have managed 50 or more wins in the Cup Series, and Hamlin is one of them. While Tony Stewart had his championship-winning runs and a successful season, he wasn’t able to get past the magical number. However, failing to reach the mark is not what Smoke is known for, but rather his talent and ability to excel and compete in different motorsport series.

Hamlin, sharing his thoughts on the NHRA driver, said, “Yeah, I mean, Tony to me is one of the greatest versatile drivers that we’ve ever seen. He’s driven Indy Car and won, I mean, championships. Moves over to NASCAR won championships… He’s gifted beyond any talent level I was ever granted with. Yeah, he’s one of the NASCAR greats, and even he didn’t get 50 wins. So it just tells you how tough it is”. 

Having already won twice since the start of this season, the 43-year-old driver is eyeing a third win. If he manages to clinch another win, it will bring him to level with legendary NASCAR driver Lee Petty in terms of Cup wins. With NASCAR heading back to the traditional oval venue at Dover, Hamlin will indeed fancy his chances this weekend in reaching the historic feat.

Surprisingly, during the conversation, Hamlin shared his views regarding the stage breaks and stated why they are important to NASCAR.

Stage breaks are an important element for NASCAR to run smoothly

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Stage racing wasn’t always a part of NASCAR and has been one of the new additions the sport has tried to work around. What the break does is allow the fans to be on the edge of their seats, to see more battles and aggressive restarts. Furthermore, it’s an extra incentive for the drivers to collect stage points along with bonus playoff points.

Explaining the reasoning behind the stage break, Hamlin stated, “I like the stages, and you know we are still in the entertainment business. We have to understand that, maybe the purists don’t like it because you are artificially stopping the race and bunching the field back up. We have TV partners that need to get commercials in. The proof in the data shows that if you have a long green flag run, they start the race, less people start tuning in. So stage breaks are good.”

Despite scoring two wins already this season, Denny Hamlin has hit a slump in his performance in the last two events. Thus making this weekend’s race at Dover an important one for him.