Actions Detrimental with Denny Hamlin - He Shouldn't Be Racing Next Weekend

Episode Date: May 30, 2023

Denny Hamlin and Jared chat about the biggest weekend in racing. First it was F1 with Monaco that once the race started was boring. Then, a somewhat controversial ending to the Indy 500 but one that fans loved. Then, the Coca-Cola 600 a day later because of rain. The oval is back at Charlotte. 23XI with two top-5 finishes. The importance of pit box selection. What happened between Chase Elliott and Denny. Should Elliott be suspended next week? Bracket Challenge update. And, #DearDenny Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Okay. Okay, what? Do you want to get to this now? Get to what? Why you're holding your chin up? Because my neck muscles aren't strong enough to do it. Sure, let's go ahead. The following is a production of Dirty Mo Media. What's up, guys?

Welcome to a very salty episode of Actions Detrimental. I'm Denny Hamlin. stunt car driver number 11 head on to the fence in the Coke 600 driver also co-owner of 2311 with Tyler Reddick

and Bobba Wallace my co-hosts is Jared Allen I'm purple vest number 560 everyone was getting on me about how do you not know your vest number it's 560 I look down today all right well it just helps the people

from the stands when they got their binoculars out and they're looking down on pit road, they're going to look for number 560 now. Yep. All right. Yeah, well, we had a, you know, a great Memorial Day weekend in the rain here in Charlotte. The weather was very uncharacteristic for sure to have, you know, high 50s and those 60s and rain on what's usually about an 85 degree weekend. but we had our fair share of racing going on.

First, we had F1 at Monaco. What did you think of that? Boring. Boring. It's such a... The start is exciting, but anything after that is just boring. Well, that's why everyone made such a big deal about the qualifying is because you knew that that's the race, right?

Like whoever gets the poll, just they win there. So unless some strategy, bad strategy happens or something, it's just, it's one of those. I get it. It's a historical event. We talked about it probably earlier this year about when we were talking about Murray Ficking Kill. Yeah. And it was like, it was Monaco. We're definitely killing for sure.

But it's just not an exciting race just because the layout of the track is a one-lane track. But the atmosphere is still really exciting. It is. You can't definitely downplay the atmosphere there. It's been good. But I feel like it's really good everywhere at F1. So I just don't know that, you know, You know, it just seemed like, you know, before the big rise of F1,

Monaco was always the one staple of huge event. It was their huge event. But, you know, yeah, you definitely, once you tune in and you see them single file out, it's not much to see after that. So I've not followed F1 for a very long time, but I'm guessing the race has always played out like that for years and years and years? It has. just because of it's such a track

you know F1's largely track position type racing anyway but yeah it's just the layout of the track I mean they can barely run too wide it's very hard to overtake for sure but you know one of the more interesting things that I've heard coming out of that

is I started following a few new accounts on F1 of these engineers that were breaking down the underbodies of the F1 cars so you know it was a big deal when like the cars crashed. I guess there was a crane that kept lifting the cars way up in the air. I saw that.

And everyone was taking pictures. And I'm telling you, that is so valuable. I guarantee you, I mean, no telling the tens of millions of dollars they spend on developing the underbodies. And you looked at Red Bulls and you were like, oh my gosh, they're racing a different car than everybody else. Like it just had so many different rounds. It's rounded edges and I forget the account that I followed, but he broke it down.

It was just like, oh my gosh, like I can't believe. I've been staring at this picture of the underside of the Red Bull car for four hours now, but here's what I see. And so certainly, you know, it's not a benefit probably for Red Bull to see other cars because I know Mercedes had their cars lifted in the air. and I think one of the other manufacturers did as well. But Red Bull had the most to lose. Yeah. If you're a Red Bull, who gives a shit the other people? They don't care, but when they got car lifted in the air, yikes.

That was a bad day for them. So surely you're going to see some new underbodies coming from the competition that hopefully will close the gap. But, you know, I saw a bunch of articles, too, about, you know, what is F1 to do about this problem? And it's like, well, you know, I like the ingenuity of it. Red Bull, and even Toto Wolf said, well, I, you know, Red Bull earned that position to be dominant. They worked really hard and they found an advantage and they're kicking our butts.

Same thing that we did for many years at Mercedes and eventually it's up to us to catch them. So I don't know about, you know, changing rules and stuff to bring people. back. I'm never a big fan of that. And F1 usually doesn't have a whole lot of griping between teams saying it's what someone else is doing is unfair. But the fact is that we got a team that's thinking up

all the races and certainly it's losing a little bit of its storylines because of it. Hey, I have a stat for you guys also. He's got a mic. He's got a mic. We got a mic over here. I'll be honest, when you started talking, I thought I was talking. I couldn't figure it out for a thing.

Hey, everyone, welcome. Travis. They can't see me. They can only hear me. Okay. But there hasn't been an on-track pass for the lead at Monaco since 1996. So after like the start. I bet you what,

you know what? I bet Mike Ford from NASCAR I bet you, I bet you Mike Ford from NASCAR could come up with some passes. Still love you, Mike. You're my boy. Wow. 1996. Is that for real? Yeah, there was a person tweeting that. He was

there's probably some things with, you know, at the restarts and stuff like that, but like while racing is going on, that was flying around. I mean, I would have said like in the last, you said a pass for the lead. Yes.

Yeah. Someone overtaking first place. How's it possible? Because you can't hardly fit two cars on the race track. I understand, but since for 20 years now, no one has passed for the lead. Well, have you seen how big those cars are

and how small the street? Ah, that's true too. They have. grown in size. They've gotten wider, longer. They are growing in size. I personally don't think that, I know you're saying that yes, they're lacking storylines, but I think the popularity of F1 was brought on

because we make it, they were able to make people think it's cool and that they think they should care about it. So I really don't think the racing matters. I mean, I have to give an absolute shout out to the announcers. And I heard, they do a good job. They make you. Unbelievable how,

I mean, they make you think, oh my God, this is unbelievable what Max Verstappen did in the final sector in qualifying. I mean, screaming in the mic saying, cannot believe what just happened. And I'm like, wow, I guess this is this is a big moment. I should care about it. I should care about it. And it's just crazy when you hear kind of the monotone that we have, right? It's just, uh, da, da, da, da, da. And so, man, it's like Lee Diffy does it.

amazing job. Wow, he calls IndyCar races. It's just fantastic. And speaking of Indy cars, let's move on from F1 since there was not much to talk about. The Indy Car, Indy 500, wow, great turnout there. 300 some thousand people. What a day for Roger Penske. I mean, all around. Forget the Coke 600. It hadn't happened yet. The guy owns the track. It's sold out. He did obviously a phenomenal job. When he bought that track, he just continued to make it better and better. Roger is someone that takes pride and, you know, looking good, feeling good type of mantra. And so, you know, you know, when he bought that racetrack, you knew that he was going to kind of take it to the next level and the fan experience. And yeah, it's just, it's cool for him to be able to experience that.

When you saw him on top of the roof, you know, cheering him on the last few laps. he even admitted like I'm not the track owner anymore I'm rooting for my my team cars so uh great finish yeah somewhat controversial finish I would say you know because typically I mean it was very NASCAR of them to like force the end of the race to go green um you know we it was very iffy whether they were going to get the race started back before you know they brought it down to the red flag and I guess they started They had three red flags. It was a green and white together when they started, right?

So there was one green flag lap. And, you know, you heard Erickson saying, you know, that's kind of unsafe, the tires are cold. We were just stopped. I see both points of view because you want to, I mean, you even said it in the bus. You're like, well, surely as a fan you want to see this thing go green. I'm like, yes, but also like can't bend the rules or make, you know,

change the rules in the middle of the game either. If you hadn't done it before, you shouldn't change it then. But as a fan watching, yes, I wanted to see it in under green. Yeah, I was very disappointed when the thought that that was going to end under caution came into my head. Because I'm not someone who's always been invested in the Indy 500. I think this year I was probably more invested than any other year for a variety of reasons. So I was watching the race more or less from the start to the finish and we get to the end. and I want to see some action on the last lap.

I want to see guys trying to win the race. So if it was to end under caution, I would have been really disappointed. Yeah. And it was interesting because, you know, the Penske cars didn't have a ton of speed in qualifying, but, you know, they just, they chipped away. And the race is so different because it is such a big handling type of race.

Like I said, I've been a huge advocate of put, you know, put these next-gen cars back on the overall. there at Brickyard, it's so much more prestigious. You know, the Indy Road course is not a marquee event. You put us back on the oval. It is a marquee event. And this car, the next-gen car has so much drag down the straightaway, so it's so slow by itself that, like I said,

the slingshot passes would be huge. As long as you slow our cars up just a little bit in the corners to make it where the wake isn't terrible, you would have fantastic racing. So I'm looking forward to going back there. I'm hearing next year on the Oval. How about the tire? We can't talk about the N.500 without the tire.

The tire, wow. Ola Snowball, which was the white Chevy Cobalt that took it to the chin. Yeah. Thank goodness. Thank goodness it was a car taking it and not the stands because obviously I got informed like, yeah, you know, Indy had some 15.

when they came to Charlotte had a tire. Same thing, go over the fence and take some people out, which is obviously very tragic. So we were very lucky in that scenario that it went into the part that had an opening. So right after the stands there in turn two, there's a little gap. And then I think there's some suites, like some VIP suites or whatever. Just very fortunate, certainly. I have a question.

You might not be able to answer this because you're not an IndyCar driver, but maybe if Connor Daly is listening, he and the Speed Street guys can answer this. Who is the driver that was clipped and then flipped over? Kirkwood? Yeah. The Kyle Kirkwood?

When he was sliding upside down, he opened his visor. Opened his visor. I have no idea. That seems like the one thing you don't want to do. You would think so. All these sparks are flying into your face and you open the visor?

I don't know. I was dumbfounded as well. But, I mean, in the moment, goodness. Who knows? It was very calm. Like, he was just very under control. Oh, I'm going to slide in. Yeah, it was interesting to see that.

And it did it. It definitely, I saw a couple of people saying, man, that looks like it was right out of the movies, like an action scene. So luckily, no injuries. You know, there was one during, practice there that that we're thinking about.

So we're, I forget the driver's name, but sorry. Stefan Wilson. Right? Yes. Okay, I remembered it. So get well soon,

Stefan, please. So you want to go to Charlotte? Yeah, not the same day as Monaco and Indy, but we did eventually get the Coke 600 in today. We were recording this on Monday night. Yep. We just got back to the race. It's going on right now.

Yep. So we're not going to be able to give our take. If there's an unbelievable Xfinity finish, then you're just going to have to tune in social media for that. But no, let's never mind me. I'm holding my head up. My neck is killing me. It hurts so bad.

I guess that's where we should start. Let's not bury the lead, right? No, we should talk about the race, but oh, my gosh, it hurts. It's going to suck tomorrow. Yeah, I mean, I thought that it was a pretty good race. I mean, one thing I'll tell you is that Charlotte, with the next gen, is such a better race than it used to be with the other generation car. I still wonder and advocate to like, why are we on the roval at this point? the reason that we didn't run the Oval twice a years because, you know, the fan turnout wasn't quite as good.

The racing wasn't quite as good. And it was just a struggle, both the 600 and the playoff race is a struggle on the Oval. But I think the races have been so compelling on the Oval there at Charlotte. I really encourage our team to put us back on the racetrack and out of the parking lot that is the end field that they call a Oval. Obviously, ticket sales were very good for this race. Yep. I don't know. How much do you think the prestige of it being the Coca-Cola 600 plays into that?

Like, would it really matter if the fall race was on the Oval or the Roval? Look at all the carnage. I mean, we're driving the same, we're driving with the same intensity in the playoffs as what we are in the Coke 600. So, you know, so Larson's been out by himself there at the end. We saw all these big names and contenders struggle. Yeah, absolutely. I think we would have maybe even more of a compelling event because it's shorter. It needs to be a 400-mile Charlotte Oval Race.

And I think the fans would turn back out for it. I think that when we switched that, it was kind of a weird time as well. In our sport, we were just more road course races. We need more road course races, and we don't need more in those, especially through a parking lot. Yeah, I do agree. I think the Oval's back. Dale Jr. tweeted it that the Oval's back and I agree. Last year's race was great.

This year's race was really good. You had comers and goers all day. Kyle Bush. Kyle Bush, in my mind, is the one driver that can wreck more than anybody and somehow figure out a way to get his track position back. Yeah, I mean, I think that actually that race played out to where you could play. a lot of different strategies because there were so many cautions. Like there would be a run.

We would run four or five laps, caution come out. Well, the leaders, they don't really want to pit. The guys at the back half of the lead lap cars, they're going to pit. So, yeah, it allows the comers and goers because of all those cautions, all those natural cautions that we have. Add on top of that the stage breaks, we have more extra stage breaks in this race because of the length of it. So I do.

I think that it was, it's a great race. Next Jim just puts on a great race at that track. We saw early on, you know, I think that, you know, kind of Blaney, you know, asserted himself.

Pretty early on is the guy that had the fastest car. He broke a long, winless streak, which was, you know, very uncharacteristic of him or Team Pinsky. But they came roaring back. I mean, they have been not even remotely part of the picture on mile and a half racetracks, being the

Ford's in general, but Penske, really all season long. And then bam, they show up to Charlotte and they've worked out something. They've got something that they've figured out that is going to make their cars more competitive. And that's just going to be more of a treat for the fans, right? because you don't want to tune in each week and say, all right, well, who's going to win? Is it a Gibbs driver or Hendrick driver, right? You know, 2311 is actually making a statement itself here lately. But this competitive balance that looks like we're starting to get back to is going to be good.

Hopefully that carries over. Yeah, Blaney was that car that obviously good all day, but he had to be there at the end, right? And it worked out with Larson's spinning that he was able to get back up front on one of those restarted and then just finish it off. Yeah, I mean, you see, like, I'm in my 2311 gear. So that was kind of my, after I crashed out, it was, you know, I switched into fan boy mode where I'm like, okay, let's go Tyler Reddick because he's got a shot to win this thing. And then I'm watching Bob Wallace, and he makes a huge charge towards the end to get back

to the top five. And it's like, yeah, I'm rooting on them. But it's funny, every caution that came out, I'm like, gosh, saying 24 is going to get the lead back here. Like, it was automatic, you know. And so, you know, I don't know if we look at it or not. Probably not. You know, it was earned.

That number one pit stall was earned because of their performance at the previous race. So it's not like it was just given to them by random draw by any means. But that race in particular, that race track, maybe we move the camera a little bit because the camera is so close to the end of the first. pit stall. I mean, they literally can drop the jack and move about 20 feet and bam and be right over the line. So that's why you saw kind of the mix up between the six crew and the 24 crew where they had a disagreement there. Well, I see both sides of it, but the six crew is the one that chose P2. And they did it because that timing line at the end of pits at the pit lane. So you gain time.

if you can just drop your jack and just barely accelerate and be at the where they score you it is i mean it's almost a i think charlotte not it's not a second but it's like seven or eight tenths of a second of an advantage having that number one pit stall so whatever your pit crew does take seven or eight tenths off of that and that's your total time on pit road which is why you saw william byron winning the race off pit road every single time a his pick crew i think has been ranked number one all you year pretty sure pretty close it's been close between the 24 the 5 the 1 and the 99 they've been all just rock solid all year long but i just i hated every caution because i'm like william fell back to third way he's going to come out first and it was like you could just

print it it was going to happen every time but it did make for you know exciting when larsson spun there it you know blaine just barely had him edged out there so um yeah it was it was it was I didn't like watching the race for sure. I was still pissed. Byron was plus 18 on pit road. I'd surprise it's not more than that. Is it only 18? Well, I guess if you're only fall back to about third or fourth,

then, I mean, there was times where he would fall back to fourth, fifth, and bam. Plus three, plus three, plus three. It was so huge. And with track position being so massive, it's like, should we give number one pits to all that big of an advantage? Like, it's already an advantage. but why can't we move that timing out at Charlotte?

Just move it another 30, 40 feet. Like he's still going to have a 3-tenth advantage on rolling time, but maybe not almost six, seven-tenths. That's maybe a little extreme. It'd be interesting to see what that looks like with a different pick crew, right? Because Byron's pick crew is good and they are consistent. Just FYI, we won the All-Star race back in 2015 or 16. Same thing.

I had a fast pick crew. I came in sixth on the final pit stop. I had the number one pit stall out P1. Won the race. Game over. Good pit crew. That's what matters. It is.

But again, your pit crew can be so much slower. And because of that stall, like the pit crew's, the difference between the number one pit crew and let's just call it the 12th, 13th ranked pit crew is about six to seven tenths. That's about the spread. you've got and then it drops off a little bit more after that so yeah it it shouldn't be that big of an advantage they can move that timing out just a little bit further because the yellow line is actually quite a bit further like because they'll tell me okay you're it doesn't matter like you've already crossed the scoring line it doesn't matter and i've still got a whole other section on

pit road left to go so they can they could push that back to make it a little bit more fair for sure So that's when your spotter comes on the radio. It doesn't matter, doesn't matter, you can still speed in that section. Yes, which it makes no sense. So you've already been scored on your pit out. So yeah, it's just an extra section. I really don't know what for it.

It seems like you would just start it right then. But it is. It's just the way it works out. And at some tracks, number one pit stall, does not mean as much. The camera out is quite a bit further away from the nose of the first car. But Charlotte, it's one that is really, really close. Number one pit stall is huge there.

I can't tell you how many races have been won because someone came out first from that number one pit stall. This was one of the first races I can remember, at least a race that I've watched, where we had some beef mid-rain delay. Yeah. Mid-rain delay. Oh, yeah.

Yeah, I looked at that. Certainly, as his car owner, I don't love it at all. I mean, just keep your hands in your car. You know, that's what kind of got him and Bowman into it. You know, last week it was the hand gesture. Like, just stop it. Just stop it.

Like, you know, just causing, you've got some positive momentum on the racetrack. It's just, let's just chill for a little while. And, you know, just take the dubs when you get them. and that's running well. I don't know how many top fives, probably like, I don't know, he's probably finishing the top five, four or five,

the last six or seven. He's just doing fantastic on the racetrack. I hate that we're talking about this for sure. Why do you as a driver take the middle finger so personally sometimes? Maybe not you personally, but drivers as a whole. I don't know. I feel like...

Let me ask you a question. If I didn't know you, or let's just say I do know. the drivers do know each other. Okay. And we walk by each, you walk by me, and we bumped shoulders and we turn around and you say, you know you. But we know each other.

Are you going to take that personal? Do we know each other? Like, can I say it in a serious manner? Fuck you. I probably wouldn't. Oh, Jesus. We know each other. So therefore, to me that...

Well, you're not friends. Right, but it just, I don't know. It feels like it just comes with the territory. No. No. It's out of style. Everyone needs, whoever still does it needs to stop because it's out of style. Stop doing it.

It's childish. It's funny when you see it on TV. I know, but you like content. I like, like, like, it's just not worth it. Like, you know, many times someone's gotten the finger and the next thing you know, they just get dumped in the next corner because people take it personally. It is. It's just not something.

You should probably do for sure. To answer your question, the last four races, all-star race included, Bubba's been top five. But yet we're talking about this. Yeah. It's just not what we want to do. Not what we want as a race team for sure. So I want to talk about how great these guys are running on the racetrack. Kim and Tyler, two top five again, back-to-back weeks.

2311's on the rise for sure. Yeah, Bubba's two was. significantly impressive because he started that last restart 14th. And two laps later, he's up to six. Well, I was looking at the scoring monitor because I was like, oh, man, he must have way fresher tires than the guys he's around. And he was actually only like, you know, two lap fresher tires. So he just had really good restart. That's his strong suit.

He's super good getting the most out of cars on restarts. Okay. Do you want to talk about why you're holding your chin up now? I'd like to circle back because on one thing between the drama, between the 24 and the 6th team, just to put a button on that, the 6 team is at fault. They're mad because the 24 is coming into his box and they can't get to their car. Well, breaking news, if you choose to pit down there right behind the number one pit stall, that guy's probably going to be running better than you all day.

he's obviously got a fast. This is on a normal week. But they knew the 24 is going to be good. And so when you choose to pit behind a good car, you're just going to have to wait. You cannot jump off the wall until he clears yours. Now, they were talking about, well, why isn't this a penalty? Because NASCAR's got this new rule where you can't impede the other team's pit stop.

Right. They said that has more to do with when you're, when, let's say Brad was in his stall servicing his car. William can't come around and cut the ankles off of the guy who's changing the tires or, you know, or carrying the tires. So, right? So that's what that box is painted there for. I heard they gave William a warning saying, don't do that. I think that's what I heard.

But it's the, that's, that's on the 16th. The 22 team did this for many, many years. They just always picked, if they didn't get the poll, screw it, we're taking P2. So if you don't outrun us, you're going to have to come around us all day. And in my opinion, you pick P2. You have to put up with it because you chose that spot that you're going to be in a tough spot all day long. You're going to have to, you know, your pit cruis is going to have to wait a minute. And so your job as a driver is to build a gap between you and the 24 car.

So if you come in right behind them and we're pitted right next to each other, my team will tell me leave a gap about a car and a half length gap for them to jump between the two cars that way it doesn't slow our pit stop way down and I didn't see whether they were directly nose to tail or there was a gap between them but you know the six team wanted to jump over the wall and the 24 is coming through it's coming through so I put that more on the 16th team if you choose down there it's your own fault so how do you I mean just how do you go about that then like you said just leave a gap yeah you're supposed to just leave a gap and you know give your that's

that's your penalty that's your penalty for not outrunning the car you chose to pit behind so that that pretty much covers that okay okay what do you want to get to this now get to what

why you're holding your chin up because my neck muscles aren't strong enough to do it sure let's go ahead This is what everyone's tuning in for. So, I don't know, you can set the scene. I feel like you were in the car. I was. I mean, we were, myself, Chase, and the 17 were on fresh tires.

We were coming to the end of the stage. There was about 15 laps left in the stage. And I felt pretty good about making some ground. The nine car was struggling. He didn't have a very good car all day. Obviously, I had time to kind of watch. go back and watch some of the race while sitting in the bus while the race is still going on. And yeah, I think, you know, I was in a position where I was trying to make a move on them.

It's the same mistake that we see week and week out on these mile and a halfs where, I mean, again, what I love about this is that it's the same people that are like, Chastain said he left them, just one lane. Well, I mean, there was a gap between me and the nine. didn't hit the nine he hit the wall uh i squeezed him up there no question about it you could see fire coming out of my car uh you can see telemetry i'm slamming on the brakes to try to stop and get off of him to make not make contact um but ultimately he made contact with the wall because i forced him up there and then through a his he fit and you know he was having a day anyway in

his opinion and he threw a little temper tantrum and decided to hook a left on us down the straight away. And not only straight away, but the dog leg. Like, I hit head on, not sideways. Like, the worst part of the racetrack that I could possibly hit. So, I don't know. We've seen this. I've seen this with him in the past. You know, when you got pissed off, when Larson kind of drove him up in the fence at California,

Larson's leading the race at the end, he intentionally calls a caution there trying to screw Larson over his teammate. And then when Harvick and him got into it, it. He came in. Where's Harvick? I'm going to help my teammate out. Blocked Harvick so Kyle Larson could win. Like, this is just, this is bullshit. And so, you know, I don't mind Chase Elliot fans. Some of them are sane. Most of them are not. Even when he got the Dawsonville pool room saying, oh boy, we need a substitute driver next week. You probably know you f*** up. You know, like, there's no explanation that he could possibly give, which he didn't, of

reason for hanging a left. He obviously didn't want to admit it. He did the, oh, I can't hear you. I'm sorry. And then, sorry,

I can't hear what you're saying. But yeah, my car just couldn't drive it. Bullshit. The wheels were dead straight. Even after we crashed and, like, destroyed our shit,

he goes down to back to shred it, and you look at both tires, front tires are pointed the correct direction. And I pointed out in the data that I tweeted that once he got into the wall, there was nothing wrong with this car. He's turned the wheel back straight. like he was going down the straightaway,

and you can tell by data whether you've got toe link damage or not. So you can tell that basically if your line is skewed one direction or another where you have to turn it left, turn it right, whether you've been a tow link or have done significant damage.

For God's sakes, Tyler Reddick pounded the wall twice as hard as he did and didn't hurt his car. Everyone hits the wall. But he threw a hissie fit and he just hung a left on us and the most dangerous part of the racetrack that you possibly could.

And it ended my day in his and in my opinion he shouldn't be racing next weekend because NASCAR set a precedent last year on this. If you want to quote Steve O'Donnell, he says, when they asked, why did they suspend Bubba Wallace? He says, our actions were really specific to what took place on the racetrack

and we look at it on how that incident occurred. In our minds, that was a dangerous act. We thought that it was an intentional and it put other competitors at risk. Jared, make a counter argument. No, I agree. I think both incidents,

Bubba, hooking Larson in the wall at Vegas, and this one today are... And by the way, as the coroner of Bubba Wallace, that was bull-2. I agreed with it. That's why I... Look at all the comments.

I said it was bullshit. Like, that is just so immature. to right rear hook someone. It's just childish and it just pisses me off because, you know, you got to be better than that. I don't give a shit. Like, what goes on in your head to think that that's the right move to make? I don't know. So you tweeted out the SMT data afterwards.

Why did you choose to do that? Because, you know, immediately, well, I mean, dude, these, these fans are. fans, golly, they drive me crazy sometimes because they're so two-faced. And I look at, like, specific instances, and I go back in their history and, like, they condone it when it goes on one side and they, you know, must suspend from NASCAR when it's on the other side. Like, it's just, like, how can you be a fan and be that twisted to, like, not recognize when your driver I'm even myself I know when I am absolutely an idiot

made a stupid ass mood like how can he not be that self-aware I just don't get it like just call a spade for once so you gain a little bit of credibility so they're looking and they're like well this caram obviously must have been broke he would never do that well why is he not before

I mean I've given you instances where he's lashed out being like a kid So, it's agitating the shit to me. I'm the one holding my head up here. Again, I look at Chase Elliott made comments May 1st about how he, unsafe he felt the cars were, but yet you think that's okay. I just don't, it doesn't make any sense to me whatsoever.

And okay, let's go keyboard warriors as, as, as, uh, Mike Joy says, well, you fence Chastain. Yeah, I rubbed them against the wall. Didn't involve anybody else. Didn't even take him out. Didn't cause not a bit of damage to his car. Right rear-hooking someone at 180 at Charlotte in the dog leg is not the same. So don't come at me with that.

I don't want to hear it. Have you spoken to him or were you in the infield care center at the same time? No. I was so mad and you can hear, I'm mad. I'm really, really mad now. I couldn't see straight. I didn't think I would pass my concussion test because I'm like, I can't see straight.

I am so on fire. If he walks through that door, I don't know. I'm just going to, I'm going to take a swing. If I get my ass whip, I get my ass whip. But I don't care because that was just absolutely wrong. In every single way, it's wrong. And so NASCAR needs to do the right. thing and be and be consistent here. You know, I've gotten the shit in of a ton of calls of these

balls and strike trial. It's time to make the right call. There's no excuse that you can give. He was going dead straight and all of a sudden takes a hard left 120 degrees with the steering wheel. That is not an accident. It's intentional. In your mind, is the right call matching the suspension that that Bubba had from Vegas or is it maybe one-uping that now? Because I feel like, you know, this is two times that a driver, the second time a driver has right-hook someone. It, it, unfortunately, other series see this, right? And we've seen this in other series.

I hate to say it, Carson Hosefar, you know, the kids got a ton of talent. He did that to someone at IRP. That's what I'm saying. You know what Gregson did it, you know. He took out a bunch of cars somewhere, but I just, we got to stop it. And if people, if the one race suspension above it didn't get his attention, well, fine, do it more. I don't care, but they need to do, if they do nothing, we're having an emergency episode. That's a fact.

And I'm going to bring up all the instances that has incurred something, a big penalty. Because, you know, I'm not sitting here crying wolf because, oh, I just. just want to see him, you know, struggle. I don't give a shit where he is in points. It's wrong. Like, do what's right. For what it's worth, NASCAR did say they're going to take a look at this in the next 24 hours.

So if this podcast comes out on Monday, I anticipate that there'll be a ruling of some sort come Tuesday, correct? Yeah, I guess so. I'm going to move on. Well, Ryan Blaney wins the race. We can already touched on that. No, listen, I'm really happy for Ryan. obviously a great he is a great dude and I know he really works hard he's got a ton of speed

and you know him and joey and that team they've kind of been a little bit of a victim of just kind of their cars have been off this year and so they like i said they haven't been as part of the story is what we're used to seeing but yeah it's it's a it's a resurgence for him i'm sure a huge confidence boost. It's a, it's a major win. I mean, it's probably, you know, probably the, it's really close between the Southern 500 and the Coke 600, which one's bigger, but maybe you probably give the edge the Coke 600 slightly on that, but it's a, it's a resume building type win for him. Well, you could see how much it meant to him on the front stretch. You know, he was brought to tears in the interview, just saying that he didn't know when he would get to victory lane again.

I guess that that's something that you could probably really, really, yeah, no doubt. I mean, for me it was i think 2018 i didn't win a race and you definitely start to set in some self-doubt i i think he's smart enough and in and in and is self-aware enough to know that uh he's he's very talented and he was just kind of he's you know can't can't drive a slow car fast and uh but you know you always just want to be well if you're if you if you can't have if you don't have a winning car at least beat the guys that you're racing with the same car right and so it's those little victories that you got to search for week in, week out. And listen, as a competitor of his, I don't want him to get going, you know, him or Joey or any of those guys because they

certainly can be tough to beat week in, week out. But I am happy for them, for sure. Looking at this bracket we have in front of us, there's no way, I mean, I obviously know that there's not any perfect brackets. It wasn't after week one. But wow. I mean, Travis, can you get us an update of who's leading? Will it be updated? Oh, you want an update of like the... Yeah, of the 45,000 brackets. I'll check right now.

Who has the most points out of how many. I want to give them a shout out. You got two weeks left. We're down to the final four. Yep. I got beat out by Bowman. Bowman Berry. Bowman Barry.

Bowman Barry. Yeah. It was Bowman slash Barry. The dream team. I don't know. Barry should have a seat next week. Maybe you'll get back in it. Stainings haven't been updated yet. Oh, shoot.

All right, well, we're down to the final four. Bowman beat Hamlin, Byron beat Harvick this week, Wallace beat Chase Elliott, and then Kozlowski beat Chastain. What happened to Chastain? I didn't see him all race. Did he have a...

I think he? he's problems. I think he's just not as aggressive. Oh, shut up, Jared. Stop it. No, they had to, that was, I mean, I would have thought that track house would be like really tough this weekend, but it just seemed like they were struggling for speed. But, you know, it's interesting. I thought all the Hendrick cars struggled for speed, for the most part, during the daytime. But then when it turned, night, it seemed like they really started coming on. So you had mentioned in your pre-race interview when you're in the car that because of the overcast, you didn't anticipate the track changing very much. Yeah. I mean, again, I never saw the night. I didn't make it that far. But I didn't think it would change much, but maybe it did. I'm not really sure. But yeah, it's, it was, I thought it was pretty consistent for at least the first 200 laps that I was out there. I didn't think it would change a whole lot, which I mean, you would argue that Blaney was one of the best,

well, one of the best, if not the best car in a day. And certainly he proved himself at night. He was the only one that could really, when he got the lead, kind of pull away. And so that kind of gives you the indication that, you know, he's not just hanging on because he's got track position. His car was very, very strong. So one other thing, too, with the results, I'm looking, I wanted to look at the rundown because when I was watching the race, I was like, man, shout out Ricky. Ricky Stenhouse continues to get better and better. That team continues to get better and better. A top 10 for him.

Austin Dillon, I don't know if that's a huge surprise, but they just kind of always kind of make their way into the top 10 before the end of the day. They kind of capitalize on a lot of attrition usually, and they grinded the word of top top 10 there. They started running better towards the end. I noticed. Zane Smith.

and the 38 top 10 career best for for zane in the cup series that's great that's awesome um j jay yalee shout out j j 16 that's awesome i thought i saw something about that was like the highest finishing rickware car on like a non speedway race or something like that so um good for them very very good for them uh but then man you see some some trouble down at the bottom Jimmy had a tough race. I hate that. I saw an article where he was talking about, you know, he just felt ill-prepared going into this race, you know, as a kind of a part-time team. That's a strain anyway on your company.

Like I was wondering like, well, man, who do they even have pitting that car? Like, because I know that, you know, they get pick crews from the outside. And so, yeah, it was tough. He didn't feel prepared. I didn't see him what caused the incident. He said, I just saw a headline that said, Jimmy says he didn't know he was three wide when he got in the wreck. But I hate seeing it because we talked about it in our pilot episode that like,

dang it, I didn't want Jimmy to come back because, you know, the most likely scenario was going to be that he was going to struggle. And I didn't want to, I didn't want to see Superman to be, to have his kryptonite, which Father Time is undefeated for sure. But not only that. and let's be real too. When you're driving, you know, Hendrick, you know, versus, you know, legacy.

Legacy is an up-and-coming team. So, you know, it's just coming into the Cup series. It's going to have its bumps in the road. And certainly I know that he's very optimistic with the change over to, for Toyota next year. Yeah, we've seen that too with RFK a little bit, right? And how there's more and more coming into their own each week. Yeah.

Yeah, definitely, I don't think we give RFK enough credit for, even when it seems like, the Fords are not quite what you would expect or they're not up to par that Brad and Chris Busher, Brad mostly has really started to come into his own. Brad's a really, really good driver. I mean, he really is. I just thought that, you know, he made a career choice there where he was willing to rebuild, right? You know, him and Penske, that relationship took ran its course, but I always thought that Brad, now I didn't know I shouldn't say I always thought

I was going to say, always thought he was a great driver but it's true, I did. Now publicly I made ashamed him a little bit because I was angry with him because of you was wrecking me in an Xfinity series all the time but you know I remember back in the day when they asked you know who's the next guy coming up

like you and I'm like well it's Brad and they're like what that guy six laps down in that piece of car and I was like yeah yeah that guy but he's definitely proving to be a very instrumental part of that organization and definitely looking like he's setting them in the right direction for performance. Do you and him talk a lot more now about this ownership stuff? Yeah, yeah, absolutely. We do and certainly we, you know, we have same opinions,

sometimes differing opinions, but we talk it out. And I think that, you know, he's an asset as a race car driver. He's an asset as an owner in our sports. So, that group was definitely lucky to get them. Speaking of ownership, we don't have this on our rundown, but driving down 77, there's some walls. Yeah.

Going up for the new 2311 racing. Yeah, I'm excited about it. I've got to figure out how I'm going to pay for it. But yeah, it's really excited to have that starting to come into its own. And, you know, they say we'll be

in it for next season, but, you know, this off season. So they got a lot of work to do. You know, they got a lot of work to do, but I trust those guys to get her done. It's cool because I know, you know, following this project of yours for the last couple years, knowing that you want this shop to be eye-opening and eye-catching. And when you drive down 77 and you see these walls up. Yeah. Off the intersteads, like, oh, whoa, what's that? Yeah. I mean, you know, whenever, you know, whenever. we kind of decide to release the renderings and stuff. I love design.

You know, when it came to designing my house, you know, I just took little bits and pieces from hotels or different houses that I've been in and just kind of put it all together into what I thought I would love, right? And this shop will be different for sure.

I'm so excited for it. I love the little design things that we've done. You know, My goal was to create a headquarters that people love to work at. And when 5 o'clock comes around or 4 o'clock, whenever the day's done, they still want to hang out there. And so I think that's an important part. These team members, crew guys, man, the hours that they have to pull is just so tough, right? And anything we can do to try to make their jobs or their lives easier, we try to do.

It really helps with moral, morale within the team. And I think we have a very good group of guys over at 2311 that really work is one. From setting up our race cars to building them, we're all, we are definitely one team. When one team wins, the other team benefits just as much. Like, that's the way we do things. And hopefully we're going to have a nice place for them to work soon. Moving on over to Dear Denny. Dear Danny, we've got some questions that we want to ask.

Dear Danes. We tried to ask Junior, but his answers were lame. And with DBC, it was more of the same. Now we're caught on you because you're our only hope. This ain't the raged track, so maybe you won't choke. First question we have this week is should cup drivers be barred, so not allowed, to run Xfinity or truck races when racing at a new track. So, for example, in North Wilkesboro last week.

Hmm. My first answer would be no, because I think it's a good buildup, but the competitor in me says yes, because it probably is an unfair advantage, but it's not unfair if you go get a ride, but not everyone can go get a ride. you know if you're hindric cars you go just go get a truck or go get a car and field it because

it you think it's going to make your team better but not everyone has those resources to be able to just oh you want to run trucks this weekend no problem i'll make that happen like that's that's a that's a good perk to have for sure so i think um yeah it's tough to say like chicago holy cow i mean is cup the only thing running chicago and we have a spin it there too right Travis, fact checker. He'll get back to us on that. But I would say, let's just say Chicago, right? Oh my gosh, it would be a huge advantage to be running another series on a track that we've never seen.

And I heard that it's so tight, like it's blind corners a little bit. Yeah, it would be a huge advantage. Xfinity's there too at Chicago. They are. Yeah. I love that we have Travis with a mic. Now pull that up, Jamie. Pull that up for me, Jamie.

Travis? Yeah, so I don't know. I mean, we're never going to change the rule, but yeah, certainly, whoever runs Xfinity is probably going to be top of the charts when it comes to cup practice. Yeah, I think it's just, you know, is running those races that beneficial?

Because you're going to run the track in the SIM, right? So how much more beneficial is it running it in a different car in real life than a different? is innocent. A lot. A lot. Yeah. It's just the visual.

I mean, even though your breaking markers might be different, it's just the visual. And certainly when you run an Xfinity or a truck race, there's just little things in the racetrack that you'd learn. Like this line, you don't want to run here or you do want to run there. The bottom was super dominant. So make sure you don't get off the bottom. Like there's just, like at North Worksboro, there's little patches that, you don't want to Until I ran and got a bunch of reps on the racetrack,

like I didn't know that, oh, it's way faster if you do it this way. And I'm sure after a bazillion laps of running, you know, Kyle Larson knew every in and out, like it proved out because he was the first one to run the apron in turns three and four coming off to turn four. He was the first one in the cup race to drive all the way down to the concrete. Well, because he was, us, we were thinking, man, I don't know, our cars, it's got diffusers.

So I don't know if you put a big air gap under there. Does it make it worse? I mean, he knew right away, well, I'm going to do that because I've got repetitions doing it. So I think that it is an advantage. Is it really unfair? No, probably not. But yeah, I would say that it'd be cool if we all just stayed in the Cup series. But again, that's not what sells tickets, and that matters.

Have you given any thought to calling more Xfinity races Or at least the driver's only broadcasts? I did the driver's only broadcasts I don't know lots of years ago I mean I didn't love it I mean I'm kind of sort of entertained But I don't know I like watching professionals do it

Because they're so good at it And when you see I don't know When you just like hear F1 commentators or whoever, like even Fox or NBC, you know, hearing the guys have been doing this for such a long time and how good they are at, you know, okay, leading one right to the other. Like, that's what makes the guys at MRN so special, right, is that one knows when one stops talking, bam, the other one's coming, right? And they've just got that chemistry that works so well. And so I like it when the professionals do it.

But, you know, would I entertain it when my career's done? Yeah, maybe, maybe. I got to stop working at some point, though. I just feel like I just overload myself so much with everything I have going on that I don't know that I want to just continue traveling every single week after I'm done driving, whenever that might be. Yeah. Well, what's the retirement? like 65 right so you got like 20 years left i got a long way to go gateway uh coming up this week what are your thoughts on gateway uh it's a one year one year anniversary oh geez i know they're gonna

play that highlight all week right me and chastain yep listen i mean here's a deal we can put that in the rear of the mirror you know what i hate this because it's like oh well is you and chastain you and l a you and you and like i'm the one getting you and i'm the one getting you can't you can't you getting wrecked every time. Like, stop the shit. Like, I'm the one that's getting the crap into these deals. So, I don't know. I don't know how to stop it other than, I don't even know.

I don't know how to stop it, but I hate that we're in the headlines for this kind of stuff, especially when I'm getting the shit in of it. I guess I did give Larson the shit in at Kansas. You know, that's, in my opinion, hard race. for sure. Definitely not anything intentional. But yeah, it's Gateway. I'm looking forward to it. St. Louis did a phenomenal job with that racetrack last year. The track president there did a phenomenal job. He also got me on a badass golf course on Friday or Saturday. I can't remember where, but I'm going to have to give him a ring again for that. But yeah, I like it. I think it's a fun track.

out they put a lot of resin on i remember at the top of that track and it it made turns three and four super wide um you know more than likely they'll probably do that again uh but but yeah it's just so much has happened with cars and uh you know this next gen that we're running now it's got so many different bars and pieces and stuff cut out of it from what we had last year that i don't know you know clearly for the one car was the most dominant car in the 600

last year and you know they couldn't hit their ass today so it was like there you just can't really draw too many comparisons from

when it's 12 months difference when it's race one versus race two yes but not when it's you know 12 months removed so I'm excited I mean I think that

we should be pretty good we've been pretty good everywhere this officially ended our white hot yeah that's true that sucks first DNF of the year as well

I know and I saw that we were five races away from five or six races no five races away from setting a modern era record for mostly lap finishes in a row and you know what who did it Chris Myers that he gave me the damn

this kickers never missed an extra point 7662 oh he just shanked it he did that to me We had a little pre-race interview, and he was talking about something about lead-lap finishes. He was like, you know, every race this year, I was like, oh, thanks, Chris. He just gave me the announcer jinks.

And he's like, and he did. He rick-allened me. Thanks a lot, Chris Myers. So, yeah, here I am with a stiff neck, a pissed off heart and a broken car. well we got actions detrimental merchandise if that cheers you up it's the only thing i i like it it's just my name's pretty big i don't i don't know if i like my name being that big it should it you know what you should have in really really small with jared allen oh no it says with denny hamlin yeah and then we need to have a and jared allen we need to change the proper

let's let's let's tiff if you're listening mike davis let's uh let's work on the artwork here We want Jared's face on something. I think we have some hats. We have some hats coming, but why don't we get like a shirt, a black shirt with like a purple vest as like on that? That idea was brought up. That's a winner. That idea was brought up. I mean, number 526?

If anyone's going to make it happen, it's you. 560. 560. Yeah. Yeah. But you could pick whatever. You could. I love that idea.

Shirt with a purple vest. Yeah. Embrotered 560. Love that. I'd buy it. Yeah. What else we got? you can get these if you are interested

if you're unlike Denny and you do want Denny's name on them and nice big lettering the logo you can get them at Dennyhamlin's store.com there's hoodies, there's t-shirts and soon to be carrying hats as well well I think that's it I'm gonna ice up sun

and get better and go get them in St. Louis to try to get in I really wanted number 50 to come at Charlotte I had so many friends in town, plus the friends that are in town actually come to the race. Shoot. Well, we're going to have to wait, but number 50 is going to have to wait, but maybe it'll come this weekend.

I'm usually good at bouncing back. I'm a good bounce back guy. We just, we did delay the taping of this because we were upstairs watching Game 7 of the Heat and Celtics. Heat. Love that. that they pulled through. No history made here.

So, I don't know how you... I don't know how you... I just don't know how you come back from down 30 and play like that on Game 7 at home. I know. I know. Game 6 was so freaking exciting. Oh, my gosh, it was exciting. But this was just kind of a...

Never really got close enough to get super excited. But our boy J.P.'s happy, itting. Yeah. Yeah. To watch the video. JP, I like that. Yeah, I got a Venmo, JP. Him and Larson, actually.

All right. Well, we'll see you guys next week, and hopefully we have better things to report. See you. Like, follow, subscribe, and all the things on socials. I will see you next week. Like, follow, subscribe. Check out Dirtymo Media on Twitter, Facebook, TikTok, and Instagram.