Actions Detrimental with Denny Hamlin - Dive Bombs, Right Hooks, & Track Limits

Episode Date: March 3, 2025

Denny Hamlin is back after his race was ruined on the first turn2:00 Connor Zilisch gets win but upsets drivers16:00 Ross Chastain reverts to old self dive bombing in turn 121:00 Denny didn’t mean to wreck Austin Dillon & why watching your teammate win sucks 25:30 An exceptional race thanks to a new track layout and tires29:40 Confusion over track limits34:30 Austin Cindric right hooked Ty Dillon38:40 Four-way battle for the checkered flag 47:35 Future of COTA up in the air For more content check out our YouTube page: https://www.youtube.com/@ActionsDetrimentalBuy your Actions Detrimental merch at shop.dirtymomedia.comFanDuel Disclaimer: Must be 21+ and present in select states. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Can you relate to him at all? Not that, as you just said, you're the same age, or you were the same age doing the same type of driving, but the fact that he's carrying... For the record, I was not doing his type of driving. Denny doesn't do that road course driving now. Shut up, Travis. The following is a production of Dirtymo Media.

I believe that I've been a competitive 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 not. The spoils of victory for Jared Allen. He's got better luck to drink and drink to win. I know, you do.

Two trophies missing from your collection. The championship and the most popular driver. Someone told me that their drinking game is when I say for sure. Yes. And I've already said it. Hey guys, welcome to Action's Detrimental. I'm Denny Hamlin, driver of the National Debt Relief, Toyota, this past weekend. came home with a strong 21st place finish right where I was running when I went through the dirt on the racetrack and wrecked the three.

To be fair, your race only lasted like 0.1, 2% of OAP. Not long. Yeah, it was, I saw the, I knew exactly how Justin Haley felt at the clash. I saw the 54's underbody. He improved it too. Wow. Yeah, Monster Truck. I mean, certainly got a knack for hitting it right on the right spot.

Wasn't his fault, though. We were all sandwiched in there trying to miss a wreck that got caused. But strong weekend of racing. We had Conner Zillich winning the Accentity race. We had Christopher Bell winning the Cup race. Which race would y'all like to start with today? Let's start with the Xfinney race. I like that.

Let's knock that out of the way. Yeah. Knock it out. Connor Zilich, the winner. I mean, it was eventful. He had a pit road penalty. Was it mid-race? It was probably early in the race.

Early-ish. Yeah, it wasn't at the end of stage one. Yeah. Towards the end of stage one. He was going to pit. He was. And they pitted there and, you know, didn't make the caution light before. They saw a car.

sitting there on the racetrack. Obviously, the team communication would be, hey, Pitt, if the pit road light's still green, he made a dash in there, but it was too late. Is that one that just, it's him he needs more reps, or is that, like, that, how quick do you have to make that call? And who's on that to make that call? Well, you're all, you can see it. You can see the light as you exit turn 19 there.

You can see it right there to your left. But truthfully, you've got to switch your eyes. from the light to the marker to you know make pit lane the commitment line and all that stuff so it's kind of on the spotter at that point but who knows where you've got spotters uh they're spread out all along racetrack um so not sure if you know if his turn 19 20 spotter had a clear view of it or not so it's it's just one of those things you're you're definitely gambling if you if the car's been sitting there for 10, 15 seconds, you're really gambling coming to pit road, you know, because there's no turning back, especially at that track.

Maybe he's just bored. And, you know, he's like, I don't really want to run up front the rest of that. Let me pass all the cars again. Yeah, maybe, maybe. I think I saw a tweet from his dad. And he said, all right, well, it's going to be a show now. And so it was wildly entertaining. You know, there were some good challenge.

challengers up there. I was really truthfully impressed. I know I'm biased, but Corey Haim in that SHR car, the Sam Hunt card, made sure we'll clarify that. They were fast. He qualified in the top six and then was in the top four, kind of in that train of lead cars. So he unfortunately got wiped out by Connor there.

Connor, self-admittedly, was just a little too anxious. when he got back there in the pack and made some aggressive moves. But what I liked about Connor was, you know, he kind of acknowledged it after the race that, hey, I got some guys I need to get in contact with that I've made contact with. So, no, I thought, you know, he's definitely very, very mature outside the race car. Inside the race car, his craft is, you know, amazing. So it's something that we're all, you know, drivers like me will look at throughout the week to see, you know, well, how's he approaching these tracks to make speed? But, you know, it's hard to ask much more from an 18-year-old to not get excited in those moments.

And you're going to have that. You know, it's always easy when, you know, you can run fast lap times. You qualify on the pole and you're leading all the laps. but what happens when you face adversity? And truthfully, I can't really remember the Watkins Glen race that much, but I don't know that he, I don't think he faced much adversity. He had some fuel mileage. He's close on fuel there, if I remember right.

But like, this was a good test to mature him in the way that, okay, I've got to go to the back, let me be methodical. He wasn't all that methodical, but still, it's a great learning moment for him and I think he's obviously going to have a huge bright future in the sport. Yeah, did you race around him at all on Sunday? I guess not. Never saw him. No, never. He was in that first lap wreck. He was part of the sandwich of me, the 54, and I think he was on the other side of the 54 and got to cut tire from that. I didn't.

So he was at the back when I was in the middle. And then when it kind of got switched up there at the end of the stage, he was in the middle when I was in the back. So never saw him. And then I saw him in the wall around halfway. But overall, you got to give him great credit for his upbringing and all the training he's done to get to this point. you know he's certainly somebody that you know is is going to be tough to deal with on these road courses

no doubt about it and he's still learning the ovals similar to SVG you know he's got some learning to do on the ovals and got some improving to do there but you know one actually had in my notes last week um for Atlanta that i forgot to mention how impressed I was with SVG in the draft um I thought he just did a phenomenal job. I mean, just with the little experience that he has doing that, um, he was holding a pretty damn steady line. Um, I was behind him quite a bit. And I'm, so familiarly, I'm a little worried. I, you know, it's like, oh, gosh, he's, you know, he's getting crammed on both sides. Like, this is typically where people, you know, kind of panic and like, you know, make mistakes, you know, when you don't, haven't done this a long time. But I just think that he's,

that he is rapidly gaining some really good experience and really getting quite a bit better on ovals quicker than what I was anticipating. Right. Well, doesn't that just come to from how much car racing experience he has and, you know, an age in racing a car versus just being young? Yeah, I mean, you know, my father once told me that, you know, elite drivers can drive anything.

And they will find a way to adapt to racing the machine that they're in. And, you know, I went through this when I was transitioning from, you know, go-carts to mini-stocks to late models. And he's like, then it's just a different machine. You know, you're still, the things that you do still apply to make speed. You just have to figure out what this car wants to make that speed. And so I think he's just a... an elite level athlete, motorsports driver that he can,

he'll be able to do it all. So one of the apologies that Connor is going to have is with a teammate. What's that like going into the meeting and you owe your teammate an apology? Yeah. I mean, it sucks. It's such a hard place for us to be, you know, is to have to look out for,

you know, the other three or four cars in our team to make sure we don't. rough them up. It's a hard balance to have, but because we all do race for each other on Sundays. But, you know, at least you won. Yeah, yeah. You could look at it that way for sure.

But, you know, he made some mistakes, right? We all recognize that, but I still feel for an 18-year-old, I mean, for God's sakes, I could be this kid's father. That's how crazy this world is right now. I could be his father. For an 18-year-old, I mean, he is so far further advanced as a motorsports driver than I was when I was 18. I mean, just it's not even remotely close. I mean, I think I was probably running third or fourth and four-cylinder mini-stocks at that age.

I think it helps too that when he's apologetic you believe it where like hosts of our last week says he's kind of sorry then he makes a joke about a boy band like Connor just came out and owned it and you trust he has the benefit of the doubt still so you believe that he'll move on and learn

well Tosi got a good conscience right I mean because we saw what he felt in that moment but it's good that he kind of recognized it and he still doesn't need it he doesn't need to let it hamper the celebration of the win. You know, you still want to be excited because of the accomplishment that you had. You know, you've won two extendedy raises now. You know, that's something to really, you know, hold your head high about. But obviously,

it was almost a perfect scenario for him that he had a learning moment, but still got the win, right? Like usually learning moments come with failure. where I made a mistake and then I, you know, I paid the price and I didn't win because of that mistake. He made a mistake and now it cost others, but it, you know, to me it was just a perfect balance for him and to advance his maturity on the track. Can you relate to him at all? Not that, as you just said, you're the same age or you were the same age doing the same type of driving, but the fact that he's carrying his age, I was not.

For the record, I was not doing his type of driving. Denny doesn't do that road course driving now. Shut up, Traff. Six more. I'm counting down. He's also carrying Red Bull on the hood of his car, a major brand where you had FedEx at a young age carrying that major brand on your car. Like, the way you have to carry yourself is different.

There's responsibilities for all these drivers, right, to represent the companies that are on their chest and on their hood. But, you know, that was one of the things that, you know, I really took a lot of pride in at FedEx, right, is there was hundreds and hundreds of thousands of employees that, when I got to go to these hubs and visit them, you know, seeing workers on the line there wearing their FedEx racing hat, right? I mean, that's why FedEx got in the sport many, many years ago. There was actually an article, I can't remember for his by Dustin Long or Nate Ryan. where I believe it was the chief marketing officer at the time, kind of was like, you know, this program has paid for itself times 10,

just simply because, you know, they got into racing because they wanted it for team morale. They wanted it for employee morale. And that's what it did is that they had a team to root for. And that's the advantage of sponsoring in NASCAR, one of these teams, is that you become the face of the team. Maybe it's that weekend, maybe it's for the whole year. If you're an anchor partner, you have a huge prominent spot there all year long,

is that for your company, that is your team now. You know, you can't, you know, FedEx right now has kind of a, kind of like a, you know, they have the FedEx Forum in Memphis. Well, unless you're going to that arena, You know, it's, you don't really know about it. You know, they're not the FedEx Grizzlies, right? They're the Memphis Grizzles. A lot of people just refer it as the forum, too.

Yeah, yeah. But when you, you know, are the primary on a NASCAR car, you know, the sport clips car, this is a sport clips team. Like, there's, you see the gear, sport clips racing. It's, you become the team and it certainly has huge beneficial things beyond the access itself that the sport has to provide. It's all really, really good stuff. It was Nate Ryan, why FedEx says NASCAR sponsorship is worth a billion. Yeah, yeah, it's a great article if you all want to check it out. But just to wrap it up on Xfinity, Carson Quaple, what a run. What a great run by him. I mean, he was given Zillich all he wanted at the end, right? I mean, I think

it was a fantastic battle. You know, another young driver that, you know, Dale Jr. invested in in the lower ranks, I believe in the Cars Tour, and then has moved him up. And, you know, whether he, you know, between Johnny Morris and Dale Jr., whoever's investing in him, that's, you know, such a great investment to give him an opportunity

because he just did a fabulous job at the end, executing as you saw at the end. He had the three fastest slaps of the race. So he makes speed and he's a guy that grew up on the short tracks knowing how to save tires like they do on that cars tour. The tire management is such a big thing. I tell you, it's just great to see these young guys coming into their own and certainly their future is bright. Yeah, that's another guy that has impressed nearly won his debut back at Dover last year, right? That's right. That's right. I forgot about that. Yeah. Yeah.

Hey, this is Dale Jr. And for the latest actions detrimental gear, go to shop. Dot dirtymomedia.com. We've got plenty of options for you. We're adding new stuff all the time. That's shop.dardomomedia.com. Let's get into the cup race. Lap 1.

Ross Chastain attempts a dive bomb move into the field that you get caught up in. Chase Elliott gets spun around. We don't have any comment from Ross after the race, but what do you make a shit? Yeah, Travis is not happy on Twitter. I'm furious about this. What makes you upset about that? You spent all week being high and mighty upset about Carson Hosefire who did far less to him than what he did to chase and everyone on Sunday. I want this from Ross, but own it.

Go to the meanings. Like, talk about it. Like, don't just hide. Like, you made your decision. Now own it. What do you think, Jared? I don't know. What's the argument as a.

driver for not commenting on it. Yeah, I'm not sure. I mean, maybe, you know, let me try to be devil's advocate here. Maybe he's trying to gather more information. I don't know. Like, you know, you heard Chase Elliott, would have Chase said after the race? He was like, hey, or maybe during the race, he was on the radio. He was like, yeah, you know, I'll get his ass, but just make sure that I didn't do anything wrong first, right?

I mean, talk about being level-headed. I mean, that is such a chase response too, right? Is he always, anytime there's an incident chase is in, I give him so much credit because he goes out there and he says, okay, I'm about to lose my shit, but before I lose my shit, can you just analyze and make sure I didn't do anything wrong first before I go out here, make a fool of myself? Yeah, like, as crude chief, Val Guffston was like, we're going to get him. And he was like, I'm fine with that, but like, I didn't do anything wrong. Did I? I don't know. I mean, I don't know about the not commenting. Certainly, I don't love it. But certainly for me, I like to comment on everything. But, you know, and it's my job, too.

But I'll just use a quote for Ross then, from my standpoint. I believe he said it this, this past weekend in regards to last week. Danny Hamlin will say about that incident I'm disappointed I'm just disappointed with the decisions what was crazy is Ross started right in front of me and he managed to to get into the third place car

in turn one I mean you got to jump a lot of rows oh wow yeah he's in front of me when we crossed the line he started right in front of me yeah it almost looks like maybe he's got a run here and thinks he can get around.

Larson, I don't know. Larson, I don't know. But why not just say afterwards? Like, yeah, I f***ed up. My bad. And move on. I don't know. Especially after last week.

To each his own, I think, you know, it's hard for me to judge why the no comment. But obviously, as a media person like I am today, right? It's my job to analyze and just say, I wish we got would have got something out of you. Or the most popular comment. I just haven't seen a replay yet. Oh, Jesus Christ.

Trave. Don't do us to me. Yes, we have to. Every week. I think Chase, I haven't seen anything. Guys, it's 2025. Let's get some tablets to these reporters. It's not hard.

The replays of these wrecks are out like 30 seconds after it. You can't give these drivers an out. You can't. Show them the replay. Make them say something. I like that. And you know what?

Travis, I like that because for us media members, it's crucial to getting that those comments and those snippets of quotes from the driver when they're hot, right out of the car,

they just got wrecked, show them that they got wrecked, right? And then we'll get those bold comments from them. Do it during the interview. So it'd be better for Fox and others to like, hey, you know, here's what happened. You know, right before they cut, you know, right before Jamie Little,

you could do it during the interview. She asked you up, what did you see out there? You know, so. Tablets cost what, like $500? I'm sure Fox can afford like five of them. Maybe. That's all I asked for. I would agree with you.

I think Travis has got a great gripe here. Let's get these drivers replays so we can get an honest, their honest take because as drivers i'm telling you now that there's many times when you get spun erect and you don't know what the hell happened all you know is you got wiped out like austin dylan probably was like what the f*** happen you just saw me just coming in there sideways right yeah and me i'm driving along thinking okay i'm just going to make a move on the inside holy there's dirt on the racetrack like in the in the in the length of the land Okay, so you, so you did not notice that an RCR car was winning the race, that a JGR car was catching him, so you decided to wreck an RCR car.

That's not true, is what you're saying. I mean, I don't know. Think what you will. Don't say that. I don't want to get fired. I'm totally kidding. All right. Let me just, let me just educate folks, the conspiracy theorist, okay.

I am a competitive person. As you may know, there is nobody that I hate seeing win more than my teammate. Because I know they're driving the same thing that I'm driving. They weren't. They had four fenders on it and you didn't. I know it's, I know what every driver. Oh, I'm so happy for my teammate winning. I mean, I love Christopher.

He's a great dude. But I don't want him to beat me. Like, that's not good. That's not a good look for me. So you always measure yourself off your teammates. And trust me, I never saw the lead all day. I had no f***ing idea who was up front. We know that because we didn't see you either.

I had three fenders on the car. That's my excuse for the weekend. I qualified well. I mean, come on. Give me a little credit here. But I mean, I got the toe knocked out, the fender knocked off in the first corner. Tough luck. I asked J.G. at the pit box, I don't know, midway through stage two, I said, what's inhibiting us more?

The fact that the car only has three fenders or just the driver's skill at road courses. You asked them that? Yeah. What do you say? It's about 50-50, bud. You know what, though? I'm still committed to getting better, though. Like, I really want to.

I mean, there was times throughout the. race where I felt competitive. Like I was catching the top 10 cars. I could see them. They were coming back to me. I was running to them. And then there's just other times when it's like, God, dang, man, just hit a mark for once. You know, it's a shame because I actually enjoy road course driving.

I just wish I was better at it. You mentioned hitting Austin Dillon. So your tires lock up or what exactly? So, if you ever been on a icy road and hit like black ice, like that's what it is. So as soon as I went left to pass them, like I wasn't like offline or anything. But I could see the track had all over it. And I, you know, you can't see that until you pull out of line.

I'm, you know, I'm up his ass. And I, and we're going through the S's. and I'm like, okay, I'm just going to go left here and get on the inside. As soon as I went left, I hear, you know, hitting the fenders. And it was like, as soon as I touched the brake, over, it spun out. Right. Because the car just has, their tires aren't touching the pavement. So there's no grip.

That's right. So, I mean, I texted Austin and said, you know, listen, man, I'm, I apologize. I ran through. I mean, it's no excuse. It's still on me, no matter what the circumstances. so it certainly screwed RCR over in more ways than one. It would have been interesting to see how the race played out. There was no given that Kyle was going to win.

I hated it because Kyle just did an awesome job all day long, leading the race. We ended up having a great finish anyway, but yeah, certainly it was probably a caution he didn't want to see either. There's the fact that the track had all over it, have anything to do with track limits? Uh-uh. No, it's the tire.

So the tire just has a lot of debris. You know, a lot of rubber shreds off of this tire, which, you know, to kind of pivot here, this is why for, you know, the first couple years of this show, we were always hammering on Goodyear like, we need tire fall off. We need fall off. This is what you get when you have fall off. This is, this was an exceptional race. It was a race where tires mattered.

Bell had just slightly better tires than Kyle Busch. Chase Elliott charged through the field from 21st and those last 15 laps to finish in the top five? Fifth, I think. Yeah. Like, this is quintessential NASCAR racing from years of old. Like, when you pit, you have an advantage. That's a good thing. Now there's overtaking.

Now you have comers and goers. This is just a huge win. I think that a lot of credit is to be spread around on what we saw yesterday. I think 50, yeah, let's give it 50. 50% is track reconfig. You know, we had more laps. You know, you were able to attack, you know, more and more corners there. You didn't have so much straightaway.

It was a lot of corners. And the other 50% is the good year tire. This was a good, good tire that had great fall off. And it promoted some just fantastic racing. Yeah, it's amazing that at the end of these road course races, I feel like they always start pretty good. Stage one in this race was pretty good. Stage two, you know, there was a bit of a lull there in stage two.

But at the end of the race, all the strategies and the tires, like they all reconvene together to give you, you know, this excellent finish. that we saw. Yeah, and it was, I mean, you know, you see it on social media that there's four cars battling for the lead with five to go, and it just was, it just was fantastic. There's no, I mean, road course racing was this car's kryptonite.

You know, I felt like, you know, short tracks and road courses. But since we have gone to this super, super soft tire, We saw the Martinsville race from the playoffs last year. We saw what it did yesterday. This weekend at Phoenix, we will have that same really, really soft tire. Now, I don't think it's the Martinsville soft tire, but it's a, you know, like the Richmond option tire. We're going to have at Phoenix.

Does that create the tire fall off to then create comers and goers? because Phoenix, it's hard to pass. It is hard to pass. And that race has just gotten so much criticism as the championship race because it's just, you know, aerodynamics. You know, this car and, you know, it's a flat track and you can't get out of each other's wake. And the wake doesn't matter as much

when you have a tire advantage. When you have mechanical grip that can overcome the aerodynamic deficit that you have is the second car. So we finally have got a tire that, you know, is allowing that. And I would love, love, love, love, love, love to see good year start to take this into mile and a halfs now. Like, you know, we've, we're getting comfortable now on the short tracks, road courses, bringing this super soft tire.

Can we start to implement that at some other tracks, some mile and a halfs to help with some of the aerodynamic deficiencies that we have there? So you're hopeful going into this weekend, I think. We haven't talked about tires. recently on this podcast and no one's talked about tires more than this podcast. Well, I mean, we talked about it when it was negative. You know, I mentioned the first couple of years, but no, it's, it's been good that it's been a non-topic because it's been much, much better.

It's just been, you know, Goodyear took risk. You know, they followed the driver's lead when the drivers were begging for, please, just give us some fall off. That's how we pass. If everyone just, if you're running on a hard tire and that's, you're, hard tire doesn't fall off and all these cars run the same speed anyway how are we supposed to pass now the setup is a factor the driver is a factor and how you manage it um it's it's just putting on fantastic racing right now did you have any confusion in this race over track limits

i didn't have any confusion um but i noticed many cars early in the race kind of kind of shortcutting six. But, you know, cars that were right in front of me, and I was like, you know, and I'm trying, I'm not trying not to call out anyone. So I didn't say anything on the radio, but I was just like, well, hmm, it might not be a thing. And then I think they started to see, my team started to see kind of via data that, like, cars were shortcutting it way more than I was and are like, they're not, they're not

judging turn six. you can kind of do whatever you want there, which I have a theory on that. My theory is the reason they chose not to judge turn six is because there's a clear view on TV whether you shortcut it, and they don't want a bunch of criticism that they missed this call, missed that call.

The other corners, they had their personal, NASCAR's personal cameras, like kind of on the crossovers, They had it facing both ways, where they had clear views of three, four, five with their own cameras. In six, if someone shortcutted it, you'd see it on TV right away. People were tweeting out SVG's videos immediately following it. It seemed like, why isn't he getting called for it? So to your point, yes.

Yeah, so maybe they just did not want to go through the criticism of not getting every single car that did it. But to their credit, you know, after practice, they would send screenshots of everyone who would be called shortcutting in the race. They gave us all warnings after Saturday night saying, here's your car in practice. This will be a penalty tomorrow. So I think, you know, the cameras that they had set up were really good, really efficient, really clear. I just think that in turn six, it just, and I'm looking around, it's like, you know, where would they mount a camera to, you know, to their own camera to monitor it? Really, you'd have to just rely on TV, I think, but I don't know. I just, I don't think it really changed much. It just, I think some people got the word sooner than others that it was not going to be called.

Do you agree with the way they didn't force it and taking out those barriers that they had to start the weekend? Yeah, those were going to be a bad idea. I mean, I understand, you know, why they initially had them in there. They didn't want to be in the business of, you know, making calls. They just wanted to let the race. right they again when you when they miss one it goes viral on social media and next thing you know oh they're why don't they call this like it's yeah but they you know they they got nine out of ten right right they missed one but um it's it's just one of those things where i think it was better

to get rid of those those barriers because you know we we make mistakes all the time and and so especially on restarts, if you have to go too wide through the S's there, it'd just be so easy to just kind of nudge someone into that barrier and it's 400 pounds and it just, it'd be a, that'd be a mess, I think. So it was good to take those out. And the meeting or before the race, do they say the turns that are have track limits or what's going on? Because I was to think a lot of the confusion is like, are you ahead of time, you know every turn that has a track limit? Yeah, I mean, we, as far as I understood, it was just all of the S's. But, I mean, turn six, you know, at some point was, was audited from that or edited from that.

So it's, you know, it's fine. I think everyone, I think some people were doing it sooner than others, but that was, that was it. there was no real consequence from allowing us to shortcut that. And, you know, when you shortcut it, it saves you time. It's got a little more grip. It does set you up bad for turn 6A, though. If you do shortcut it. Yeah, it's a bad angle.

So it's just, you know, but it's got more, it's faster. But if everyone's doing it, I mean, I don't see the big deal. Right. You watched the race back this morning. What did you make of the Austin Centric Ty Dillon? incident. Yeah, I mean, it didn't look good. I didn't look at the,

it's not SMT anymore, it's NASCAR zone system. I think SMT got the boot for something. Yeah, they, I didn't look at that, the data on it, but it, I mean, it looked not great. Clearly, he was upset with Ty

kind of shoving him wide there, not giving him, room to exit turn 20 without running in the grass. So that's kind of a, you know, I definitely, in road course racing, like kind of running people wide on the exit is a thing. But certainly you got to give them a chance to actually be on the racetrack. But the two didn't have that opportunity. He got running the grass.

And then, I mean, looks like he retaliated. But I don't know. anticipate there be any consequences that comes from this? Points of penalty, suspension. Like, how do you judge this? Because it is a right rear hook, right? But it's not the same as others. I don't know.

I don't know. I feel like we're an influential group here. So should I really say? Like, you know, because people will take it and run with it. And then if it's, if it does or doesn't, it's like, You know, I don't know. Truthfully, I'm going to Ross Chastain this one. Because I don't, I didn't, I don't have the data to sit here and say,

did he or did not, he not, like, turn hard left. If the data shows it, it's going to be a hard one to not to avoid a penalty. but if it looks at 50-50 I think that they're they'll give them the benefit of the doubt and tell them buddy you are close on that one and your eyes should it matter that it's not as fast like if you're on a super speed or something or is it right hook a right hook right hook right hook there's a wall on the right side that's my opinion to be fair at the right course there's typically walls on both sides not always uh barriers I mean, he did hit the wall. I mean, it shouldn't be the severity of the outcome that decides whether it's a penalty or not. And I feel like that's a lot of the time, that's the case, right? Is had Ty Dillon hit the wall really hard, you know, really hit the wall and then bouncing the racetrack, I think that, you know, we're talking about a different conversation.

But in the subconscious mind, I think that it plays a role in whether NASCAR chooses the penalized or not. Correct me if I'm wrong. Which I don't think should be. Correct me if he does get suspended, any playoff points that he gets wouldn't count, right? It's not just like you lose anything that you already had. It's the entire regular season. All those points are wiped away. We talked about this after the first week, and I got it wrong.

I don't know the rule. I think you're right, though, that it's any playoff points. Like, he could win next week, and if he gets, or the following, after suspension, those points will go away. It's not like it's because you didn't have any, you're good. Right. I think you can start accumulating them once you get into the playoffs. Correct.

Right. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's how I got corrected on when we commented on this first time. Yeah. Playoff points would be forfeited if a waiver is granted after suspension. So regardless of what happens, it will continue to set a very substantial precedent going forward for you drivers.

We got the battle for the win at the end of this race. Your caution obviously played a part into that, but Kyle Busch, Christopher Bell, William Byron, and Tyler Redick all raced pretty cleanly for a handful of laps there. It was a really exciting race. Yeah, it was a great race. And certainly I think Kyle Bush said it best, kind of with Bell's patience there.

You know, Kyle was certainly trying, all he could to hold him off. And, I mean, you've got to give Kyle a tremendous amount of credit. I think that he had the fourth best car at the time while he was leading. He held on the lead way longer than he should have. But, I mean, just a master class by all four drivers. There was contact, but nothing egregious. Everyone was able to stay in it.

good contact on a road course going for the wind nobody spins out like that's it just put on a fabulous show certainly very entertaining for the consumer watching it i mean Kyle bush more or less said he's surprised there wasn't more contact because of the way he was racing yeah yeah i think that you know it kind of depends on who you are in the sense of what your expectations are but as as as someone who, if you make blocks on people, right, eventually they get tired of getting blocked, they're like, okay, well, if you're going to run the bottom, I'm just going to kind of hammer you off the bottom here.

But C. Bell was surprisingly really, really patient, even with the 24 within a car length of them. Like, you know, usually the, you know, anxiousness will set in and you'll start to think, okay, if I don't get past this guy, I'm going to burn my shit up eventually. Like you can't just sit on someone's bumper. Like it really, you know, heats your stuff up and it makes your car go away.

So he just had tremendous poise to, you know, work over the eight as good as he could, as long as he could, with the 24 sitting just a half a car link, one car link back. And so I was actually surprised Byron didn't put up more of a fight. I'm wondering, you know, surely Bush was holding up, we know Bush was holding up the 20, but why wasn't the 24 pressuring the 20 more? Was it because he was just waiting to see the outcome of that? Or was that all he had at the moment? It looked like it was all he had.

But, you know, he was taking big arcs into the corner, trying to get big runs off. But it looked like he was just fast enough to keep up until they both cleared Bush. And then, you know, then it always becomes easier to be the chaser than the chasee because then the 20 is thinking, okay, I've got the lead. Don't screw up here. So he's going to back it down to about 90, 95 percent on corner entries because the last thing you want to do is give up the lead without making them work for it. So then the 24 has just got a huge advantage being able to not only gauge himself off of the 20 car on corner entries. go a little deeper, but he's got the advantage of, you know, I got nothing to lose here.

I'm going for the win. So he rolled him back in at the end of the race. But I thought really the, you know, the 20 is probably the strongest car there in the last 20 laps or so, you know, the right kind of car, right car won. And yeah, it was, it was just a great battle to watch. Who, in these multi-car battles, who has the biggest advantage at the end of these race? imagine everyone is on a knife's edge knowing that if they make a mistake, they're going to lose any ground or position that they have. Like who's... Like, like, Bell, for instance, he's trying to pass

Kyle Bush, right? He knows he has a better card, but he's using his stuff up trying to do it. But now he's also got Byron on his tail, who's chasing him down. Kyle's trying to hold off both guys. Yeah, it's, I mean, I think that Byron's got the easiest job because he's got two guys. He's got two guys to go off of. He can set himself. So as the eight and the 20 are countering, so eight is being defensive, the 20 is being offensive. Well, the 20 has to, will change his line on entry, maybe to go wide, go low. Like the 24 is the easiest job because he's able to counter whatever defense that the eight gives the 20, which is why I was surprised that the 24 wasn't able to get more in the battle than what he was.

So the 20 then's got the next easiest job, and then the eight's got the hardest job, which is trying to hold off these cars when you're not the fastest in the moment. So Reddick made a huge run there at the end as well. He rolled those guys in four and a half seconds in those last eight laps or so. So he was going to be part of the picture as well.

Yeah, you noticed his lines that he was taking. They were very different. I feel like he was taking a wide. wider entry to a lot of corners than the three guys in front of them. It was such a tricky thing though because there was many times where I would try a wider entry

and I'd get up in the loose where the tires had rubber marbles all over it or dirt on the track and then I'd lose it and it's like man it's such a fine line between getting in clean racetrack you know poking out to get a wide entry for a low

exit versus getting up in the loose stuff. It is it is you're within six inches one way or the other. Christopher Bell goes back to back, one Atlanta, wins Cota now, and schedule really sets up well for him going forward, Phoenix next week, and then Las Vegas, which he should have won in the fall, or easily could have won in the fall.

I don't know. What does this mean for Christopher Bell, the question that all the drivers hate, what does this mean? Well, I mean, I think the first thing is, you know, the riding, the high of the back, the back. That's that's one great thing. The next is that now you're, you know, got, you already got a multi-win season, your three races in. And so I think that the pressure is off.

Now you're looking to just stack up bonus points. And, and win as many as you can. As a driver, you know, certainly I guarantee you that's in Christopher Bell's mind, you know, today is, could I win eight races, ten races this year? I mean, last year, we had three of the first seven or so. something like that it was like oh we're going to win eight races this year um but stack them up why you can because you know these wins are hard to come by and nothing is a given um so i i think that they're just on a tremendous high and the schedule's looking great for them now you mentioned you don't want to see your teammate when because you're in the same car so you've seen them back to back where are you at let me clarify that you're happy for them you're happy you're

You know, like, after the race, I'm congratulating Heather and Joe because, like, it's a big win for the team. Like, it's great for them. But as a driver and as a competitor, we do not like seeing our teammates win because it's like, you know, then it's the license of registration, please. The flashlight's on you. It's like, you know, it's just tough because you're like, God, dang it. So where are you at? What am I missing here? The season's been early.

It's two super speedways and a road course. Right. So long season, so are you kind of like, all right, like now the racing begins and I'm okay? Or do you feel like... For me, yes, for me personally. I mean, this was not a good start schedule-wise for me to, for the first three races to be two super speedways in a road course. Now, the super speedways just gives me anxiety because I just, I always get crashed in them, right? It's not anything that I'm doing wrong.

I feel confident in the moves. I mean, you almost could have won the 500, but it's just, you know that you have a chance to end up with three 30 place finishes in a row. And so now certainly we're going to racetracks where we're going to start to get the measure of where the field really stacks up. Certainly after Vegas. What's after Vegas? Homestead. Yeah. Okay.

Well, after Homestead, like, then I think we can really start analyzing. who's got speed at the first part of the season. Before the weekend started, Denny, there was rumors out and about how there is no contract going forward between NASCAR and Koda. So is this the last race we see it Kota? Do you think they'll get a deal done? They'll be here again next year this time. Yeah, I'm not sure. I mean, I think there's just things that we don't know about or the general public doesn't know about.

you know, this is, this is, you know, Marcus Smith's date, right? He took this race from the other Texas, right? Well, yeah, we only have one of them, right? He took, he took a date from one of his other tracks and put it here. It just, it depends on what the new lease price is, truthfully, right? I mean, there's, there's a number where Marcus will be happy with profiting a certain amount of number. for this race weekend. So when you say at least price, what NASCAR is willing to pay him for the weekend? No. So I believe NASCAR pays SMI or Marcus Smith for this race weekend.

He can put this race on wherever he wants to. He can do it at one of his own tracks. Or he can go get a track and pay the lease fee. And there's probably a balance there because if he runs it at one of his own racetracks, right? There's cost to that. You have employees, you know, you have people that you got to clean up, you got to run the hot dog stands, you got to, you know, there's a, there's a, the nut that he has to cover at running

it at his own track. Now, what is the cost of that versus what is the cost of what Coda charges him? And for the last few years, it's, it appears it's been a good deal for him. That's why he's kept it there. Or maybe it was a three-year deal when they first initially did it. I don't know. But, you know, if I think whether we come back here is going to be largely based on, how much should they charge them? Do they increase the price 30, 40 percent?

And then Marcus says, oh, screw that. Like, that takes too much profit away. And so I'm just going to put it back at one of my old tracks. I think if they increase the price, they, We probably won't go back if they keep it the same. I don't know the financials of it, but they would keep it here if it still makes financial sense to them. So it's an SMI date,

but does NASCAR have a say in where they race? Right? Because Austin's a big market for them. And frankly, there's not many places you can go on the NASCAR schedule at the end of February and it'd be great weather like we had in Austin this weekend. So despite it being an SMI date, does NASCAR, like, do they have a say?

and like, hey, you know, this is good for us. We want to be here. Yeah, I'm not sure what the agreement is with SMI and NASCAR. You know, does SMI get a certain amount of dates or not and they can do with them as they wish? Or does NASCAR influence where they go? I'm not really sure. But certainly it's a partnership between those two. And certainly, you know, it's a tough, yeah, I mean, early March,

you are going to be kind of limited on where you can go. You know, you can go places where it's cold. I mean, you got options there, but I don't know how many, just offhand, I don't know how many SMI tracks are kind of in the south, you know, where it is warmer. My guess is probably not many, but I don't know. I don't know.

Yes, it is a, I think it's a great facility. You know, when you drive up at night, like it's just, it's cool. I mean, it feels like a professional racing stadium. You know, the guys that own it, it's a group of guys, right? I know, me and, me and Bubba were going to that Texas game. Horns down, draft. I'm a little upset you didn't have Ohio State trying. I'm going to make Charlie.

Come on, man, I can't do that. They invited us. I shouldn't say Hornsdown, because they were very, very nice to us. Horns up, they're the most polite fan base. Even in defeat when Ohio State beat them in the Cotton Bowl, like, how nice were the fans, Traff?

They were like, go get them, guys. You played a great game. They were nice, but still. Horns down. Do you guys? Well, you say it. I'm not saying it. I'll say it.

So. Did you plan this? No, I did not plan it. No, we know it's not. Oh, Ron's here. Red Rock's round. I didn't. This is my Ronnie Hats version of the New Year.

Oh. Okay, okay. So Ron's saying that he wants his official hat here. The mantra for the year for, this is Ron's mantra, not necessarily. This is for the boys, right? The Dream Team? Yeah, every year I do one.

Yeah. Eleven against the world. It's got some Ohio. date to it, Trabb. You know, I co-signed this. Yeah. I mean, 11 against the world. Yeah, just figured out

stop down, surprise, you all. Well, thanks, Ron. Thanks for coming by. Appreciate that. So, yeah, I mean, where were we, by the way? Oh, just the,

Coda. Does it matter? That looks great. That is awesome. It looks good. Does it matter that, you know, it seems like the track or who you know they're building that massive amusement park outside kota yeah i

heard about that like there's a lot of uh you know new infrastructure being put in so so so what might happen right is the is whoever owns the track is liable to say hey i'm putting a lot of improvements here um price is going up yeah that that's how this stuff goes typically and so um ron can you speak to like the owners of burkdale when they made all those improvements rent goes up, right? Because the way they see it is they're bringing in the people. So, you know, Koda could be going through the same thing. And then Marcus just has to decide whether it's worth it to him or not.

Right. And the price of Charlie wins Caesar salad goes up. That's right. So. All right. Well, hey, one quick thing. Before we get to our merch, IndyCar got a taste of Denny Hamlin's problems.

They got the cart. Everyone was so excited for IndyCar. I guess during practice, they had real photos. I sent you a tweet of it. And then in the race, they gave them the characters. Yeah. Wow. Why'd they do that?

I don't know. But okay. But on, when Amazon Prime does our practice and qualifying, we have real photos. Yeah. But Fox and. assist when it's on theirs to give us the cartoons, huh? Apparently, also shout out to CW. I feel like they're crushing it right now.

CWs, their booth is just on it. They don't scream over each other. You got a play-by-play. You have an analyst. You have a co-analyst. And it's just, they do really good just giving each other the time to explain versus kind of going all over top of each other. So CW is just done great, which I think NASCAR Productions plays a big role in that.

So. Cudos to NASCAR Productions. Yeah, it's good. But yeah, I saw the IndyCar folks are just very upset with. Who's photo, Scott Dixon? I thought it was Scott McLaughlin. Everyone was like, like, he was like big, wide-eyed. They were like, who is that? So I tell you,

from my standpoint, if you want to create star power, at least show our face so people would recognize us. Right. Yeah. I've heard that this is just something way, way high up in Fox that somebody is adamant about doing.

But the people don't love it. I'm looking at you. The people don't love it. Here's what we need, tablets for interviews and real pictures. That's our recommendation. All right. merch. New merch. As you can see hanging here in the studio, we've got this beautiful,

off-white actions detrimental hoodie. I personally love that hoodie. It's got the dirty moe on the sleeve too. You can't really see it. But that, I'm going to wear that today. That's fire. And then the namesake or the rule sake, whatever the term is, rule 12.4.4.2.1B. Actions detrimental with the old gavel I like it and then we've got a nice classic tea here with the old actions detrimental logo

up in the it's clean it's good color in the corner and that's it those are the three samples that we got best 311 yeah I heard that that's coming Mike Davis stopped me at Daytona before the rain just will it be like a black shirt

with like a fake vest it should be right I don't know that's what it needs to be I mean I I think we let Jared and whoever else You might have issues screen printing though like that much on a shirt but maybe not, I don't know. We'll figure it out.

Who knows? All right. Well, you all got a review? We got a review here from Pauline D-19. It's kind of funny of the review that I tricked. I did not plan this. Hey guys, my husband and I just listened to your last episode and had a few ideas for your motto.

All speed ahead, full speed ahead, or fully invested. All true. All very true. Someone tweeted, I don't know the name, but they tweeted at me, or they exed at me. I don't know.

The 11 logo. I called the age. Yeah. You just got to add the D and that's pretty fire for a logo. Yeah. How's it taken? He says, hey, I got an idea. And like 2,500 people like that.

Like, it was, you know, let me hear from you in the mentions. Is that something you like to see is me to have my own little personal. That not be the motto, but like the DH 11. Is that a cool hat? It would be a cool hat. So we'll try to give him a shout out when we, when I figure out who it was. Check it out. At Almany, Almany designs.

A-O-M-A-N-Y design. Oh, that's who... Yeah, or just go to Denny's Twitter, replies, and it's like three down. You'll see it. All right, well, that's a show. I appreciate y'all tuning in.

We will see y'all after Phoenix. How are we doing... I'm going to stay out west after Phoenix. How are we doing... We don't have to discuss that. This show. I don't know. The plan is the same, though.

Yeah, there'll be a show. There'll be a show. I'm saying the same house that we actually did the remote, the pick-a-ball house. Yeah, they're all pickleball houses. With the ferns. Yeah, it's the one where we had the like the fireside chat.

It's the one where Ron didn't leave his chair for five days. Different house. Different house. But I'm debating going there for the championship race. I, you know, you got to get these houses way, way early. And so that house is available for November. I really like that one. So I might pick that one up.

still waiting for you to go back to the Sistine Chapel painted ceiling house. I haven't found it. Someone must have bought it. So off the market. All right. Well, appreciate y'all tuning in. We'll see you after Phoenix.