Denny Hamlin failed in his bid to clinch a 4th career Daytona 500 win last weekend. Naturally, he was kicking himself for the lost opportunity and rued what could have been. However, he insisted that not a lot of the blame fell entirely on him. Hamlin didn’t even blame his fellow competitors for costing him, either. Instead, he laid most of the blame at the feet of the nature of NASCAR superspeedway racing.

Then he dropped a massive bombshell, insinuating that he was getting tired of it. He did not spend 20 years learning from the best, studying and understanding NASCAR, only to be on the receiving end of a wreck. Hamlin bemoaned the fact that everyone crashing in the race has become so normalised.

Driving the No. 11 Toyota Camry on the final lap, Hamlin could imagine crossing the start-finish line and celebrating his fourth Daytona 500 triumph. Battling it out with Austin Cindric for the lead, the veteran driver for the moment got his mojo back, adrenaline rushing through his body, finally overcoming the superspeedway hoodoo. But, little did he know that the infamous “Big One” was about to sweep his dreams away, and when that happened, it snapped him back to reality.

Denny Hamlin just couldn’t avoid the inevitable

Drafting on superspeedway tracks is nothing new. The drivers often made most of the pack racing on the ugh banks of Daytona to get the momentum and make moves to advance further in the field. While, pack racing is still relevant, in the era of spec car and parity racing, the drivers have little say in the outcome of the race. If you are out of the draft, you’re basically shot up back in the field, and that’s just the nature of speedway racing in the Next Gen car.

But despite the drawbacks, Hamlin wanted to give the Daytona 500 a fair chance to rekindle the racer in him. He certainly played his cards well, avoiding the wrecks and finding the support of fellow Toyota drivers like Chase Briscoe and Riley Herbst. But, the inevitable wreck on the last lap just killed his joy. “I’m leading the race into green-white-checkered. Like this is the reason I got into NASCAR racing. I spend decades learning how to do this and watching the best… and I’m gonna get rewarded for this.” The JGR star opened up on the Actions Detrimental Podcast.

Fast forward to the pack heading into the backstretch to turns 3 and 4, Cole Custer went three-wide and tried to cut off Hamlin’s run. Well, Custer did more than just that and traded paints of the #11 car, to the extent that they all ended up wrecking. This is when Hamlin came to terms that this style of racing will never reward the craft he’s developed over the years. “We crash at the end, that’s become normal at the Daytona 500 and that’s what then kills my enthusiasm for the whole thing. This is what I wanted to do as a kid and I was about to get my fourth and putting myself in the elite company with the greats of our sport.” He added.

The irony is at a time when Denny Hamlin has failed to recreate the Daytona magic since 2020, William Byron has won the crown jewel race back-to-back. On one hand, you’ve got a seasoned driver with over 15 years of experience on the superspeedway. And on the other, you’ve got a sim race, who seems to know a thing or two about how to nail the finishes even when the whole field is crashing. The high drag, restricted horsepower style of racing is good on TV, but that is not the case for the drivers who aren’t able to control their destiny on the track.

So, what’s the solution for this? Another shark-fin gimmick, or further reducing the power of these gas-guzzling race cars? Well, it is just hard to see NASCAR make any major change to the current package. But, if we are to go by Hamlin’s words he feels that bumping the engine power and doing away with the rear spoiler might just do the trick.

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Hamlin has got a remedy for NASCAR superspeedway woes

The best way to race on track like Daytona and Talladega is to line up behind the leading pack. Bumper to bumper, the cars just push each other with each passing lap. While the leader might be open-wide or full-throttle, the cars behind them will milk the draft and reduce the time on gas. This is where they save more fuel and spend less time on the pit road for refueling. Why do they do that? Well, in a race where you can’t go side by side, the pit road is the place to make significant gains in terms of track position.

But what happens when everyone is done playing the chess game, and the finish line is in sight? You see this is where caution gets thrown out of the window, often leading to wrecks and crashes. It’s a given that cars will crash on the last lap in superspeedway races. And that’s just the drivers playing to the tune of their race cars and the strategy that everyone rolls out with. Could more engine power and less focus on drag help separate the good race cars on the day from the mediocre ones? Denny Hamlin thinks this will do the job.

“I don’t know if I could just throw out my suggestion for NASCAR to please, please, please get drag out of these cars. Reduce spoiler size, please! I just think that we’ve got to get drag out of these race cars…  Getting a large chunk of drag out of these cars, reducing the horsepower back to what we had before. I just want to see us do something different to put the sport back in it and take luck back out of these prestigious events. What’s happening now is, our prestigious events are just all luck-based, and you will not reach legitimacy in sports, that way.” He explained further.

Now with the 2025 season up and running it is just tough to see NASCAR bring out major changes to the superspeedway package. But this is something they will need to think about consciously as the current state of superspeedway racing needs a major revamp.