Actions Detrimental with Denny Hamlin - A Win The Family Will Remember

Episode Date: March 16, 2026

On this episode of Actions Detrimental, the guys break down a chaotic Las Vegas weekend that ended with career win No. 61 for Denny Hamlin and the No. 11 team. After a speeding penalty on pit road nearly derailed the day, the team rallied back to the front and led 134 laps to take the victory. They also discuss the pit road miscalculation, the adjustments that kept the car fast, and the disciplined drive that sealed the win. They also talk about finding their rhythm again after a tough offseason, the special family moment in victory lane, and the goal of winning one of the next three races. The guys also weigh in on the tension between Ross Chastain and Daniel Suarez. And to wrap things up, a friendly fishing competition turns into a full-blown rules debate after a very questionable weigh-in. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

What I didn't like is Ross Chastain telling reporters basically no comment. I know. Talk, man. Like this, you want to help grow the sport? Talk. God, Travis is lit. The following is a production of Dirtymoe Media. I believe that I've been a competitive me for 20 years.

Opinions from tonight's podcast, strictly biased. You're going to hear from my point of view. I'm a fighter. No, you are. The spoils a victory for Jared Allen. He's got better luck The Brick and Drake to win. I know, you do.

Two trophies missing from your collection, a championship and the most popular driver. Someone told me that their drinking game is when I say for sure. Yeah, and I've already said it. Hey guys, welcome to Actions Detrimental after Las Vegas, 26, first race on a mile and a half this season. It feels like, well,

as Joe Ruggum say I'm not in hit film, man. We'll forgive you. It's like 12 hours since winning the race. Yeah. Three hours since you getting home. Nine minutes since waking up. Just for the record, this was your idea.

Okay. All right. What a day. What a day. Where do we start, fellas? um a riley cup what do you all want to do what do you all want to talk about

i think we should start with your race okay cup race um man i just uh I knew from the beginning of the weekend uh that that we had a very good feel in the car

the corners were connected um what I mean by that is that the um a lot of times when we're talking about cars on the radio you'll hear us talk about we're blank on entry, blank on middle, blank on exit. It could be tight, it could be loose. But this one just kind of was connected.

You know, it was doing one thing, and one thing is usually easy to fix. And we have so much experience at that racetrack. I just felt very confident we could get it fixed and that's what we did. But what about your teammates? Your teammates also seemed pretty good. You're not worried that they would also have one thing to fix and maybe better than you are? I mean, yes and no. I just think my style of driving seems to be fast on these mile and a halfs in this next-gen car.

So, you know, it seems like. you know, Bells qualifies really, really well. He almost won Vegas, I think a couple of years ago. I remember him and Larson. That was the Larson, him and Larson. But also the Lugano fuel mileage win. Wasn't that last year? Mm-mm.

That was fall of 24. Oh, my. Because remember it got him into the next round or something like that. I know. It feels like. wasn't even last season there's two seasons I know I know

yeah I mean all my teammates were good like in practice I was able to catch Bell over the long run actually Ty Gibbs was able to catch me a little bit in the long run we're all really close and then Chase was

had decent speed as well so we're all close yeah we're we're right there but I just I I knew kind of early on in the week. And then stage one went how stage one went. And for us only to fall back to third when essentially had I done it all over again, I would have said, okay, been very clear.

And here's what I want you to work on. Even with as bad as the balance was, you know, only falling back to third there, that first stage, it was a good sign. Yeah, the whole race as it played out, TV kept saying, you know, if Denny falls off the way he did in stage one, then nine cars going to get to him. But I guess you knew all along you weren't going to fall off like that again. Yeah, that was the hope. The hope was, okay, undo that, go back the other way. And that should help some of our issues.

And you had miscommunication, though, too, on some of those changes, right? after the first stop. Well, we really don't talk about changes. Or what you're feeling in the car. Yeah. I said at some point they asked about the car. I says I'm a little bit edgy. I thought I said I'm edgy,

which basically means, you know, you're really soft with your inputs because you're afraid to turn the wheel because the back is stepping out. But I mentioned, I thought that I mentioned, that, yeah, middle of the corner. I'm tight. That's what I kind of need, uh, worked on. But they worked on the edginess, um, and not the tightness. And, uh, so they doubled it up and,

and we got really tight at the end of stage one. But, um, came in, uh, fixed that at the end of stage one. Um, and then we get that penalty. And it was like, we didn't get a penalty. You did. no well we the organization got a penalty right that's true that seems like maybe our lights were off i mean i was shocked yeah you were in disbelief but isn't it isn't a black and white call either you are or you aren't yes but if what i'm saying i'm in disbelief of is that if i run my lights the way i you're you tell me to i shouldn't be speeding And I thought that I ran my lights very similar to what the team wanted me to run. And therefore, I was shocked to hear that it was over because they, you know,

they give me a little bit of a buffer. Sorry, I'm yawning. So it seemed like, and we all sped in the same zone, right? The very first. So that just means, I think, that, we. So that just means, I think, that we miscalculated as a team distance between the lines or NASCAR's scoring of that zone, whatever it might be. Because for all of us to speed in that one spot, that means that it was a quote unquote hotter section than what we thought it was going to be. But you didn't speed the first time.

No, because I'm always, again, if I run my lights correctly, I'm always going to be a little bit under. But it usually takes me really blowing through one or two red lights that I shouldn't be in the, I shouldn't be touching to speed. So maybe if I blink one red light, which is most likely what happened, I sped. I they should the the margin for error should be higher than that typically so I think that there was a miscalculation and how hot that section was did you think you were really going to struggle to regain your track position after that I somewhat I was not overly confident I switched my goals I talked about all the time how I moved my goalposts after every caution every stage you know what do we got what what is the potential how can we beat that um and so at that point yeah it was like let's get back to the top five um that was the goal under caution as i'm letting 30 cars go by uh i just knew you know even though we had a you know two stages left to go just takes so long to uh to get back to

the front and um because the arrow on on these next-gen cars. It's very, very tough. This is one of the most aerodynamic-sensitive racetracks that we go to because it's very narrow. It's a very narrow mile and a half. So there's not a lot of places to go whether or not. Like Kansas is much wider of a racetrack.

Michigan, much wider. But once we took off and I was about 15 laps in and gained, I don't know, I'm throwing out a number 10 spots in 15 laps it might have been 15 and 15 that's what it felt like I was like there's there's plenty of time left when he told me put this way I think he came on the radio

I know you listen to the radio that we were 14th and we hadn't even pitted yet to get to the middle of that stage I was like yeah we're good we're fine did you have to make big adjustments to the car after being in traffic? Oh yeah. Yeah, we came back in. After we, we got the

speeding penalty, I said come back, let's come back down and do do more. So how does that work? So you have to make adjustments to the car now that you're in traffic. So you have to go away from the original game plan. If I'm running up front, this is what I need to be fast. Now you got to switch your mindset to I need this. And then you go back to the original game plan once you get up front or you're now just working from what you have. That race, we adjusted on the car more than I've seen in quite some time. We were cranking on it.

My pick crew, that was what was so impressive with the pick crew is that we're not losing spots and we're making adjustments. Typically, you're always losing spots when you're making adjustments. Many times you gained a spot. One time. Yeah. There was one stop that I was filming that just, it didn't look like a good stop. But then you still came out and you still gained a position.

Well, a lot of it too, you know, what does your competition do? They have a bad stop. Sure. Yeah, it just kind of depends. But yeah, it usually what you need in traffic is different than what you need out front. but my car, it just had some speed and reserve. You know, even when the balance wasn't perfect, I still was the top five car at the worst.

When you, I want to go back to the speeding penalty for second. When you have that penalty, do you just have to mentally adjust? Because you can't change the light settings or anything. So like, how do you as a driver make sure you don't make that mistake again? Because you can't adjust like your car and what it's showing. Yeah, I just take, I take the, speed limit and I lower it a mile per hour. You know, that's the easiest way to do it. So let's,

in my dash personally, I've got all, all the lights are green. All green is all good. And so if it's, let's just say it's 10 green, then I'll just move everything to nine. And just for the record, when you hear, I saw in the Denny Bro's chat, you were talking about the, um, something about the no mistakes. And I was like, and I, and I, because he said, hey, you were almost speeding again somewhere. That's what alert. That's why I think our speeds is the company was off. I never, usually when you speed, it is a situation where I, I know I'm close.

Please don't key the radio and tell me I sped. Please don't tell me. Please don't say it. Don't key it. Okay, we're good. We're good. And when he said I almost sped again in another section, that's, told me we're off because I I shouldn't be close. I feel like he said one read a lot on Sunday.

Yes, but what I'm saying is what I ran, it shouldn't have been close. Yeah, that's what I'm just wondering if that was off. Trave said somebody get me on the radio and tell D.H to press that gas pedal down a little more. I didn't mean on pit road. That was that was a good text. That was a great text. So, yeah, I came on the radio and it says, yeah, yeah, no, I'm not making any more mistakes because our car is way too fast to be making mistakes. I can't believe we led 134 laps. That's half the race. I guess the other half we were buried in traffic. Yeah.

Or making your way back to the front. Your car on those restarts was a missile. Really fast. It just took off. Really fast. It was her strong suit. Typically, I'm a long run guy, right? It's long runs.

You're going to see me start marching forward. There was a key run, though. I was really good beginning and end of the run. End of stage two when I charged all the way to fifth. I mean, we were just really, really good. No issues there. struggled a little bit that one where

Byron got around me with about 55 to go same thing just wore the right front tire out did that caution did it matter did that caution help you and helped

helped I mean I was getting pinned behind those lap cars it was horrible timing horrible time that whole last room was horrible timing because

there was cars that had to take that chose to take a wave around, they're out of fuel, so then they had to come out seven laps after green. So the difference in the disparity of my car's speed or the leader's speed versus those cars that were lap down was about seven laps on tires because we just kind of sat right there behind them. I took notice of it at the end of stage one when you were battling Bell, but when you're leading like that and trying to keep a guy behind you,

but also then trying to focus on where these lap cars are going to go so you don't lose time, right? How much focus is put on each of those? Like, okay, I got this guy behind me, but also I got to pay attention to these two cars in front of me who I need to drive around, and they may not be driving much slower than you are. Yeah, what's interesting on a mile and a halfs

is actually if the cars in front of you on better tires. If you're, you're actually getting a draft, it actually helps you run faster with a car out in front as long as it isn't detrimental to your actual cornering ability, which is, you know, you're handling. And it just seemed like I could run a different line than them. Wherever they chose to run, I'll just run somewhere different. And so it allowed me to get that clean air in the corners and then use the draft down straightaway. So it actually helped me maintain that lead for a little while. But the crappy part was is that after the new was gone from their tires, then they were

just kind of in the way. And then it was like, crap. And it was horrible timing with Cody Ware because he came out 15 laps after, you know, we started that green flag run. And so he was quite a bit faster. And I'm trying to wave him to stop. Let me pass Ty, Dylan, please, before you get in the middle of us. And then once his tires were going to wear,

then I'm going to have to have a hell of the time trying to pass him. So it was, and I think they were all like three and four laps down. I understood if it was like fighting for the lead lap or maybe one down because your race really changes when you get two. But I think they were all multiple down. Bell had brought up that you had a unique line in the final stage, such as how good your car was.

I didn't think I was running anything super unique. I just was always running wherever they weren't. But you could also run wherever? And what would happen is if they chose to mirror drive me, I would just swerve to a different lane in the middle of the corner. So, yes, I think Larson said something as well. I just was trying to get the cleanest air that I could. There was no rhyme or reason to it.

How much says that when your car, you can take any lane and it still has what you need? it's it's rare it's rare how did it at phoenix how to hear that's one out of every five or six races right yeah so 61 wins now you're take over 10th on the list just by yourself it's awesome can't tell you how awesome that is and and you know just yes the the off season was really cruddy for for a lot of different reasons and it sucked and so it was I was not looking forward to the beginning of the season I mentioned that it just was like God I can't believe I have to go race I don't want to go race right now and that was on top of the Phoenix like debacle and so yeah I mean I I showed up

up at Bowman Gray. I made laps Bowman Gray. I actually finished top five at Bowman Gray in the semi-wet. Well... There was a lot of stuff that got you to the fit. Yeah. Yeah. But I don't know. I just wasn't into the season.

You know, I think some of it too is it's always a mental thing where it's like, oh God, we got two super speedways and a road course. You know, it's it's not like a normal oval where it's like, oh, I know, if I nail this thing, I'm going to win. You know what I mean? The next six weeks of our schedule, whatever it is, you know, these are all tracks where it's like, oh, if I nail it, we're going to win. It just was different. And so

that was a different mindset. I wasn't really ready for racing quite yet. But just kind of when we got to Phoenix is when it was like, okay, let's buckle in. Let's get into a normal routine of this is how I'll prepare on the weekend. Here's how I'll prepare during the weekend. It got me more in a rhythm of like, this is what I'm used to doing. And then Vegas was more of the same. So what's the next goal now? You know, okay, we have next Darlington.

Kansas, right? Martinsville. Martinsville. I'm just thinking of the tracks. You've got Darlington, Martinsville, Bristol, Kansas, and then Talladega. Get another win. That's the goal. One of those two races.

One of those three. Talladega, I wish, guys, I wish. I'm trying everything when it comes to Super Speedway racing, just not getting the proper finishes. I'm trying to run up front as much as I can. It doesn't matter. crash. Next three races, how many points?

Like if I said you get 150 points, it would be 50, 50, 50. Is that? Oh, yeah. Yeah, we would take that. But also, I mean, like, bigger than the next three races, right? Like, we've been on this train of get to 60 wins for a few years. Now you're at 61. You kind of know where the checker flag is on your career.

Right. I thought that realistically it was, I think I'm I don't know I think I'm going to fall in 67 that's where I think it ends

more than likely if it you know in the next year more than likely 67 maybe that's just you know by the numbers that's not any

oh I feel this I feel that that's just where the numbers land averaging what I average three or four wins a year yeah

yeah what did the embrace with your mom mean yeah that was great. I mean, she, uh, she went to Daytona. I don't know about any others. I can't remember. Really can't remember. She did go to Atlanta. But, you know, none of my family, um, mom, dad, you know, fiancee and kids, none of them were at the 60th. West Coast races

It's really hard with the kids Because you got school and stuff the next day It's just impossible And my typical rule of thumb If I can't get them home By 7, 8 o'clock on a Sunday You know, they're not going to go to the race

Because I just got to get up Got to go to school the next day So You know, while it's cool to be able to FaceTime them Like we probably did in Victory Lane at at at Vegas in the fall it's just nothing beats when they're actually there because they get to that they get to create that memory they're not going to remember watching 60 on TV because I can

assure you three minutes later they were probably gone and doing something else yeah you know what I mean the memory was them riding in the car and mollie picking up the confetti in victory lane and throwing it like that's where the memory's kind of get made is when you're in that moment. So it was really fun that I had everyone there for this latest. Yeah, and that hasn't happened ever? I don't remember. That's a good point. I don't know that I've ever, not I have, but I can't remember the last time we had everyone there at the same time, right? See, my mom, it's my mom travels as much as Jordan does. but not always the same weeks.

Right, but I also mean Taylor and Molly have never ridden in the car to... Taylor has. They haven't once before. Yep. Oh, that's... Yep. That's why in the group text I said...

In the group text I put, I said, we just passed tech, we're good. Yeah, and that's what I said in post-race media. I says, Taylor's got to enjoy this. And the one time she did, they took the trophy from me five hours later. Like, that was bullshit. You didn't think, like, Taylor.

I can't have you get in this car. I know. I just, you know, especially Molly, she hadn't got to do it before, but it was so cool because, like, I didn't, I didn't tell Molly to hold that flag out. Like, she just, she just naturally did it. So it was very cool. I love their reaction. They got in. When they got in, they were like, oh, my God, it's hot in here.

Like, damn right it is. I love the reaction when they're on top of the car and they were getting sprayed. I don't think Taylor was expecting that. No. And someone did, McMurray said that Molly nearly fell and somebody caught her. Yeah. Yeah. Brandon was putting her up on the, on the roof.

And then she just like fell backwards into his arms. Oh my gosh. That would have been horrible. Yeah, luckily that didn't happen. Back to you holding off Chase. I know Lambert was calling out times. For most of that, where you just, like, let me just match, chase and just save my tires? At any point were you ever like, all right, I got to figure this.

I got the lead up to about 1.8 at one point. And I felt like it's just different. What I feel comfortable with is a one second lead with at least one lap car between us. because I know that that one lap car is going to deviate or slow their lap time at least a half a second, usually a half a second. Like it's, he's going to get closer to the lap car. That's going to slow down. He's going to have to pass them.

It's going to slow his lap time down. It's just, I know that one second is really like 1.5 when you have a lap car between you. And we had multiple between us. And so I just kind of, I didn't take my foot off the gas, but I just managed. the gap. But he certainly, I thought we were equal on speed. If I pushed the gas all the way down and really had to push, I think we were going to be pretty equal. But he was, he had gotten better throughout the entire day. He just kept getting better and better, which is very chase of him. And it definitely reminded me of that race in 2021 with him where I'm leading.

and he kind of reels me in late. And it's, you know, we're racing around lap cars. Same kind of thing. Same outcome. So it was, I don't know, it certainly feels good to have that versus like your tongues hanging out and he's still, you know, he's reeling up. He's a 10th faster. He's 2 10th faster and you're doing everything you got.

I knew. And Vegas is a very risk reward racetrack when it comes to pushing it. Like I was just wanted to be disciplined with hitting. line in three and four. Let's just hit this line for 50 laps. If I got to slow down to hit the line, that's what I'm going to do. Now, could I have run the middle, pushed it, run the middle, and run faster? Most likely. But I just was like, this is the conservative approach. I got the lead. Don't need to do anything crazy. Make them outrun me, something they haven't done all day, unless it was at the very end of any certain run.

So I just felt comfortable with, and that was the best strategy for me to manage, and it worked out. At what point would you have needed to switch on and try something different, push harder? Well, it was with a couple laps to go. He actually got to a distance with no cars between us where I pushed a little more.

And that's when we ran essentially. I think he beat me with two to go lap time-wise. and then I beat him on the final lap time-wise. But he, I mean, the thing goes 10 more laps, who knows? I mean, it was his car versatile. Could he run middle? Because at the time, I was running his line in 3 and 4. So it, you know, it would have been interesting, but it's ifs and butts.

With this win, you also now join Jeff Gordon, Kevin Harvick, Richard Petty. And Mark Martin is the only driver is to win five plus. races after making their 700th Cup start. Yeah, that's I think Daniel Suspidus, doesn't he? Yeah. Yeah. The win

percentage is solid right now. Someone's the best back nine in NASCAR history. That's cool. That's a funny one. Old dogs can hunt? Yeah. I like the, I wasn't sure what stat you were going to bring up, but I like the one about winning in 20 different

seasons. That list was strong. I think it was Bobby Allison, Dale Earnhardt, Jeff Gordon, Richard Petty. Like that was a, that one, because it's hard, man. I can't emphasize that enough, you know, winning in 20 different seasons. It's hard enough to win the Cup Series, but I feel like five years ago, if you would have asked me, man, can you believe you've been in the Cup series for 15 years? I would have said, no, it feels like five years ago.

But now that we're in year 21, I think it's 21, it feels like 30. I feel like I've been in this thing for forever. And I love that we're still can go out and compete and win. It's awesome. I remember you started the podcast. 60 was the goal. Yeah. That was, yeah, I've had 31 wins.

going into 2019. I have 30 wins after 2019. What's the difference maker? I don't know. To not dive into it too much,

but I just, I work on weaknesses. I find areas to get better on the racetrack. I study things. I analyze things. I,

just find ways to improve. Do you think switching to a car that promotes more parity is actually beneficial to you because you can find advantages elsewhere in preparation? In hindsight, possibly. I still think that the Hendricks, Skibbs, Penske's, those teams used to be able to build bigger advantages into their race car. but the casual race fan would say, well, it seems like you have to be with those teams to win today.

So what's the difference? This is a valid question. I don't think the advantage is as big as it used to be, but it certainly still is an advantage. And it's a resource thing. They just, those teams spend more money than everyone else. and until you kind of have like some salary cap or something I just don't see that changing

what else here Travis what else we got in this race? Swares Chastain Swares Chastain Do you see this? I did Who wins that fight by the way Swarres right? Everyone is like oh

Swarres better watch out the Chastain didn't know and I'm like hold on a second here He threw McDow Yeah McDow is a grown-ass man I think this is like a evenly matched fight, like maybe hedging towards Sauras being the favorite. Well, I like Ross's chances at connecting because he seems like that he's very good at that. But I just think eventually strength comes in.

Like, yeah, Soura's might catch one to the chin. But if it doesn't hobble him, I just think he gets, I think he gets pummeled because of the size difference. And it's not like Swar, listen, there's not a giant size difference, but I think there's a, there's just a, there's more unlikely a strength difference. Add in, I think Swar's probably got a little more buildup anger towards chest ain't in track out. So was, was Ross the one inviting it on? Is he, is he in this clip saying you want to fight? Maybe. It also looks like he told Swares, you got fired. It was that, is that, is that real audio or? I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. That's, why I'm going. Because, yeah. That's tough.

But also he's the one that put his hands on Soros first and that like, that's a, that's right. You know, if, never mind. I'm not going to pile on as far as considered. Yeah, thank God. You're all in like shit today. I get the PR person's kind of doing their job.

Although actually Spire ran worse than track house, right? I mean, they finished next to each other. But, man, PR person, just can you give us five seconds? She seemed very comfortable stepping between him,

which means she obviously knew Daniel very well. Yeah, I think it's, she works for track out. So yeah. But did you see, I mean, we think we saw a video where Swaras kind of got up into trust,

but is this like, is this just the excuse to confront each other? I think it's been brewing. I think it's been brewing. I don't know. You see on X, there's comments, you know, they get thrown around. I just, I feel like it's been brewing. I always thought from the exterior that their relationship was good.

You know, they do a lot of content stuff together. But you just never know. You never know. I mean, they're more of, they, I feel like they've been racing for one seat, those two guys, right? Whoever, whoever prevailed at Trackhouse and it was more successful was going to get whatever car and then SVG and Zillich were going to get the other two. Yeah, I just don't think that it was ever a question about Chastain, you know, losing his seat.

Right. But that's maybe where Suarez feels a little bit of animosity. Yeah. Yeah, it's a results-based thing, and you would just say over the long haul that Chastain outperformed them, right? Like, more times than not. Like, I know Daniel also Cisputis has a chart of, like, which teammate outruns the other teammate the most. And it feels, it has felt like, you know, Ross has been the lead car at trackhouse. all of his career. What I didn't like is Ross Chastain telling reporters basically no comment. I know.

Talk, man. Like this, you want to help grow the sport? Talk. Travis is lit. I'm with you. Listen, sitting in this room, there's three media members here. We would love to have a quote that we could run with, right? but it feels like Ross is just,

when there's something that happened, he's just not going to give it to you. And I agree with you. I agree like for the sport, storylines, it would be fantastic if you would just give us something to work with, but he's not going to let us in.

Okay, so that's Denny Hamlin media person talking. Now, Denny Hamlin driver, when you see other drivers. Well, I'm different. I'm a shit. I'm going to talk at any time I can. Right? I mean, if I have an opportunity or I have a beef with a driver,

I'm going to dig the knife when I can. But that's just my personality. And I do it with my closest friends. That's what they know. Gluck in his article this past week about you and you were talking about playing pickleball. And yes, it doesn't matter who. I can't play.

I can't play with Jordan. absolutely not when we we have games you go play pickup they'll say do you want to play with Jordan no I don't want to play with Jordan

wait why is this is she I'm too competitive because she I'd be like Jordan work on blank don't tell me what to do

so get to the net and yes it's just it's it ends badly no separate us. I need to be with a partner that I can tell them when they suck and they can

tell me when I say. I was going to say for the record, he tells this to everybody. I know. It's not. Opie takes the most abuse. Yes. Because he takes it. Opie is one of my favorite people to play with.

Just simply because I think he's very, very funny. Yes. And he has these little small comments. He's like, I love you too. You know what I mean? It doesn't matter. The harder, harsher the comment I make,

the more he endears himself to, oh, thank you. Thank you for that. Yes, I will absolutely work on running faster than I'm able to. You know what I mean?

Yes. Where were we here? I don't know. We were talking about swords. And anything else from the cup race? And by the way, I didn't see anything on track that warrants why these guys got face to face after the race.

That's what I think. That's why I think there's something, there's something more. An excuse to get into each other's face. Yeah. So what do you think of the standings now? It seems like it's, that claim is starting to. We're moving on up to the east side. We're moving up.

It just shows that how much a win can put you right back in the picture, right? I mean, I think the most we were probably down. 120 something, 130. You got the paper, don't you? After Codea. Check us, Kota. Kota minus 126. Oohie.

And now we're only down 70 something. So nearly half is gone. Two weeks. It ain't like Tyler had a horrible finish. Tyler ran fine. Yeah. Which maybe I need to back up the truck a little bit on, oh, he's a guaranteed lock for top three, right?

Yeah. think that's true. I just think that, yeah, there's too many points to be gained with wins. But he still has a really good start this season. Chase Priscoe saved a potentially awful issue. Yeah, I looked up. I couldn't believe he finished eighth, but obviously a fast car. But yeah, it was good for him to get back to the top 10. He needs some points. On the flip side, SVG, I think, had the worst day in terms of dropping in the standing. Yikes.

Yes, minus 16 spots. How many was it? 11? 11. 11. It just, when you go from 5th to 16th, that's like going from 10th to 35th. Yep. And he ran fairly well at Las Vegas last year.

It just seemed like track house was not, they weren't dialed this weekend. You know, if Ross is going a lap down, I'm sorry, you got, there's, they, they missed it. Ross didn't miss it this weekend or SVG didn't miss it this weekend. This was a, uh, there's a team thing. And that happens. I'm telling you it happens. It's so easy too that, you know, somehow you just sim says, you know, your simulation program, your setup says you need to be running this. You run it. You go to the racetrack and it's like, nope. I mean, we talked about last, remember it, it comes out with an equation. Here's what. Here's what we, the computer says you should be running to run the fastest lap time.

And sometimes it just doesn't match. So like how though, when like you've gone to this track before, like how does a team just miss it though? It doesn't take much, especially in the next gen era because we just talked about how close the cars are from. I mean, did you all see the lap times on the Fox graphic? Everyone's running in the 31 second bracket. Like, so it doesn't take much for you, you lose a half a tenth. The field gains a tenth from last fall to this race. That takes you from fifth to 18th, 20th.

That 10th is what matters. Yeah, small margins. Yeah. I just got a text from Bozzi, some graphic, and it was showing pit crews, the slowest and their fastest time, and you guys had one of the most consistent days. we did it was very consistent smooth day it felt like they weren't like rocket fast but they were rocket solid that's what you want right is just don't lose me a spot and again i talked about how many adjustments we made like we were making lots usually that that that is going to slow the pit stop

up several tenths of a second is there a switch when it comes to these pit crew guys where they could recognize okay our driver has a lightning fast car let's just have a have a good stop here. We don't need to press it for it. My guess is yes. It doesn't always appear that way because there's been many races where you're thinking, okay, just keep things smooth and then you have a bad pit stop. They try, but it's hard. They're dealing in really, really small margins as well. But yeah, typically you would think that, again, I'm thinking at the end of stage two when I got back to fifth. And that's when we said right before we came on Pit Road, I said, I'm not, we're too good. I'm not making another mistake. I'm thinking they

probably had that same mentality. And I'm thinking, just get me out somewhere in the top eight and I'll, I'll be, I'll be fine. Yeah. You'd have to think it's like similar to a pitcher, like three oh count. Let's just put one over the plate here. You know, I got my guys got a great car. Let's just put them back out there. Yep. Kyle Larson won Xfinity race on Saturday. Shocker. I think it is a shocker. Yeah, it wasn't all...

No. I didn't see the whole thing, but... He did not lead to the very end of the race, and nor did I think he was the fastest. When I say shocker, though, I'm just saying, like, for him, it's not shocking that he could win that race, not like the race itself. Well, if you didn't watch the race and you looked at the results,

you'd be like, Not, yeah. Yeah. You would say what you just said. Shocker. But it was watching it. I actually thought he had the third best, maybe second, best J.R.M. Car?

Or is that a Hendr. No, it was a J.R.M. I can't tell Hendrick cars. Well, that's how you know. If I'm celebrating Larson, it's a junior motorsports car. Okay. Got it. you know we got to call this pretty much straight

Corey Day was damn fast and up until the very end of the race I thought he was going to fucking win it and like give us all the bird I'm watching and saying well he woke up you know he somebody lit a fire under him

that was he you got to call it correct if we're going to criticize him we got to call you know a spade of spade when he's when he goes out there and runs a really good race like he did this weekend uh shelding creed owned it but what do you make of the holy between him and taylor gray it looked like me and chase elliot and martinsville right just get to the back bumper push all the way in yeah which isn't Interesting when that happened, I didn't feel like I, when I watched me and Chase, not to bring that back up. It's 20 years ago. It's actually 10.

Almost 10. Sorry, behind your head. It didn't feel as egregious in the car as it looked on TV. I was just barely on his bumper. I'm telling you, it was not hard contacted up, barely on his bumper. But it's just that is such a vulnerable part. of the racetrack for the rear getting stuck and I unstuck him. So I think it's very similar to that sense of where the contact wasn't huge from the double zero on Taylor, right?

Taylor. Yeah. On Taylor, but it just, it's just a bad part of the racetrack where that's the lightest that the rear of the car is going to be. And so Sheldon definitely. should have backed her up like I should have backed her up yeah at least he won't have 10 years of and he acknowledged it I mean we you got to well well what did he say what did he react to right he said holy crap I screwed up and he owes me one that's very fair yeah what do you think the good race poll will say I know I see people about it uh what's it gonna say

say I did not hear the tear. I don't know where they're at. I didn't hear the tear down. I heard the first half of it before my internet went out on the flight home. I'm going to say 64%. A little higher, right, Trayv? What do you think, Jared? Well, I heard the tear down. But what do you think, though? Oh, I thought it was, I thought it was right in that 75% range. I thought it was a fine. I thought it was a race you were not going to be right jared it is sitting right now it's 62% oh wow oh the guys on a chair down guess 75 right i mean the poll just came up so it you know i i don't know what we expect i mean the restarts were dicey the one that i was in the back i saw those guys three wide racing for the win or racing for the front i mean i don't i aside sometimes someone hits it and the 11 car hit it and

And so it happens. And I don't think a lack of cautions is always a bad thing. That is good racing with no issues. Yeah, there was only one caution for the zilich. And that was, to me, I think that's the biggest variable in this and why people say it was a race. Because it just flew by. There was no cautions.

There wasn't too much excitement. Yeah, I just don't. I think you got to manage your ex. You're not going to always have a barn. burner in motorsports. That's not the way it is. But if you're an avid race fan, you understand that sometimes someone hits it and that's

when you've got to just say, all right. Yeah, you have sports all the time. All the time. There's blowouts all the time. But also... It ain't like I was up front the whole race. No, I was going to say it wasn't a blowout either. Huh?

I said, I don't think it was a blowout either. No. Well, because you sped. It helped. Well, not only that, but there was all. Even still. There was always somebody within a second and a half. Yeah.

Yeah. You didn't know if Chase was going to get to you or not at the end. You weren't surely on in the race. Byron Bell was better. JGR and Hendrick really brought it. And there was no one else who was going to contend with them. That's right. Yeah.

The RFK and 2311 cars were the next in line that were in the back half of that top 10. But welcome to some mile and half racing. That's just what it is. Welcome to Fri-NAS car. What are you talking about? I mean, that's what it is. So that, I mean, that's why we want to take that next step at 2311, right? And I think that over the long haul, you know, while we won the first three in a row,

it was like, okay, well, what are we going to bring to Phoenix? What are we going to bring to the next tracks? Shout to Boba Wallace due this week, right? Mand is due this week. He is just chipping. I mean, the guy's finishing top 10 like it's his job, which it is. And he will be there for the birth? will be there no matter what.

Yep, which I 100% support that. Man, I couldn't imagine missing one, but he did. And I bet that just absolutely sucked. That's tough in this format, but I get it. Like, the family's more important, but it's, it really hurt, you know, missing a race. Yep. And now we're through this west coast wing. So there should be no issues, right?

Yeah, he's going to be closer by no matter what. Yeah. It's not Mexico City. All right. I got to get to court. He wants to end this, Trav. Yeah. He doesn't want to touch on the fishing. I wouldn't want to talk about an event that had a lot of just cheating.

I'd be doing Charlie wrong if I didn't at least mention that it is on the rundown. And if Denny doesn't want to talk about it, that's his choice. I'll give it two minutes of my time. We had a competition we talked about last week, five biggest fish in Vegas and rock. Riley Herpes's pawn. It's not Celine Dion's pawn. Riley Herpes's pawn. And I had no idea it was going to get this close.

But anyway, let me be 100% clear, and you guys can give your feedback on what... I'll do what you say. We'll do a poll. How about this? Is this fair? I'll do a poll. And the two choices is,

I need to do a concession speech. or the results are just too muddy. Is that fair? Sure. You know. Yeah. Or demand a recount or demand a redo. Let me tell you the actual facts that,

and this is the facts. There's no anything else. We had to have two different scales. He's on one side of the pond. I'm on the other side of the pond. By the way, they're both my scales. the cheap ass one, and go buy his own scale,

so he has to borrow one of mine. Pre the night before, we're like, we got to make sure our scales are the same. Well, mine is reading in pounds and ounces. His is reading in pounds only. So, I know. And so then they have to convert it.

That's a whole other problem because you know when in a conversion, when they do my ounces, it's just going to round. to the nearest where you know I don't know what well if mine's whatever you get it

so we weighed a banana the night before and it was only a half a pound and if you have a disparity in scales it is not going to show up when you're weighing something that's a half a pound it's going to show when you put actual weight

to it yeah right you agree like your scale in the hotel when you step on it, it's going to read different than the one you have at home because there's the disparity there. Well, yes, in the hotel, we agreed, okay, our scales are the same because we weighed a banana. But as in racing, you'd go over the scales before and after a race. And there was something that happened during the course of the event that caught my eye that made me want to challenge whether our scales were the same. Can I tell you how that went?

Okay, I will. So I was actually standing next to him. He catches a fish. It's 3.26. He holds it up 3.26. And it just didn't look like a 3-2-6. Is this on camera? I assume Nico was...

I sure hope so. It's got to be somewhere around. That's what your L's job was, is to follow us around and make sure it was all kosher. Now they're going to... I mean, go after their refs here. I know. I know.

This is a shame. Charlie was the one question, y'all. Yeah. I looked at it. I was like, uh, do me a favor. Use my scale.

I just want to see. This is, this is on his like, sixth or seventh fish that he caught. He grabs my scale. 3.00. Oh, whoa. Whoa.

That's a quarter of a pound difference. He then was like, nah, something's not right. Let me, redo it on my scale. He redos it on his scale. Now it's 3.08. Yeah, 3.08. Oh, I have that. I have that weight logged here. I have that fish. So I'm, I'm, I'm accurately portraying what happens. I'm not exaggerating that this is what happens. So my scale where it says it's just three pounds zero zero.

They would give me credit of 3.00 for that fish. However, what does he get? Three point zero. Three It doesn't seem fair. So there's either disparity of rounding on the scales part or there's a disparity of the math. We go ahead and we weigh in. So let's just forget the fact that there's no way he weighed his fish two or three times to get and then ended up logging the least amount of weight. He just, whatever it is, he would have wrote down three to six had I not been right there and challenged. that the weight. Let's just say.

I also have a 3-2-6 on here. So I don't know if we're talking about the 308 or the 3-26. I don't know how we can validate this. I get it because I'm going to put a button on this story. We go to the final way in. I weigh in. Let's go to him. He weighs in at 19.8.

five low right under 20 yep i weigh in at 19.5 8 it was like a quarter pound or less than a quarter of a pound it was two tenths of a of one pound Travis my problem is we saw that disparity in one fish yeah i got multiply that by five the scale couldn't pass tech if it had to that's why i'm having an issue conceding that I lost. Moral of the story, Travis. And by the way, so then we went, did we not? We took the scales.

We took the scales because this is an issue. We took them back to the bus. We weighed my book back. And there was a disparity every single time. There's not one time I could make my scale weigh as heavy as his did. Not once. You can't make it weigh the same.

Nor can you make it way more. We did it 100 times. Can't do it. His always reads heavier. And so if I lose by two-tenths of a pound, over five fish, I think that there's just too many, it's too gray.

I agree. Travis, moral of the story. So on demand and a recount. We have a damn good trophy. Man, you all killed that. Excellent trophy. You all killed it. The content from this is incredible

of these two guys doing laps around this pond, racing to spots while they can all see the fish in the water. I don't know. I heard Charlie laughing. You were showing them probably all my bloopers and and then I have I have 24 hours of additional footage of these guys. Jordan's trying to get a family photo outside the sphere after they come out of Wizard of Oz. Denny said, argue Charlie, the scales are not accurate. Danny, let's take the family photo. Charlie, there's scales are, there's flaws. And then videos of you guys at catch eating a nice dinner, weighing your backpacks. Backpacks out of Las Vegas, probably nice.

We did. I brought the scales. I was like, we're going do this right here right now. I'm going to prove it. So whether there's a winner for this or not, once I go through all the stuff. He has the trophy. I hope he feel, it's an empty empty cup, Travis. How can you feel good about that? I mean,

if I was an honorable man, I wouldn't even keep that trophy. You just put it in a neutral spot and say, you know what, we'll run this back. Yeah. If he was honorable, he would. I'm not even saying that, all right, let's just take the difference of our scales, add them up, and I'm now the winner. I'm not saying that I'm the winner. I'm saying there

There's just the disparity. The race was too close to call given the variables of the scale difference. We'll see if Charlie wants to be an honorable man or not. It's up to him. Thank you, Travis. Anytime. I mean, at least somebody earned a trophy the right way.

And a title bell. They each got a trophy this weekend. Everyone's happy. I mean, this guy, on the ride home, by the way, he had his feet kicked up on my trophy. On the plane ride home. It's unreal. No respect.

From KMC Davis, 01, love that 2311 is doing so well after a year they've had to deal with the last year. Also, MJ giving credit to Denny for putting this team together is awesome. Appreciate that. Thanks for that review. Appreciate you all tuning in. All right, Travis, set the goal. We need to win one of the next four weeks. I want two.

Unlikely. I think, I mean, listen, we'll be a favorite at... You're going to be a top five favorite at worst at all three. Next three. That's... We're... So, Travis. We're always a top five favorite.

Okay, so for me, to ask for two is not a crazy request. No, I'm thinking Darlington, Kansas, Martinsville, I think we might be favorite at all, the favorite at all of them. Yeah, we're sitting the bar at one. But it doesn't... It just doesn't matter. Like the one year that me and Harvick were... Or old dogs going to win or not.

Yeah. The year that me and Harvick won all the races, we were the favorite at like every race. But you only win a few that you're... I... Realistically, one is the goal. One is the goal. That's what the goal poster at.

That's what we try to achieve. We'd love to say, oh, we got to win all three. But you're just going to be disappointed living in your life that. way. Can't be. Welcome to how I operate with sports. I know.

That's true. Okay. Well, appreciate you all tune in. Travis is going to have this out early in the afternoon, right, since we started early?

Yep. Sweet. All right, we'll see you on next week. Check out Dirtymo Media on Instagram, Facebook, X, and TikTok.