Denny Hamlin was reviewing the last laps of last weekend’s race at Kansas Speedway, and he believes he let one slip away from him.
As we all know, Kyle Larson won by 0.001 seconds over Chris Buescher, but it was Hamlin who led when the final caution came out, bringing the field to green for the final restart.
During the most recent episode of his Actions Detrimental podcast, Hamlin explained why he selected the inside line rather the outside, and why he felt some regret.
“It’s probably the caution coming out. Certainly, I would have second-guessed, or done something differently, when it came to lane selection,” Hamlin said, when asked whether the final caution or final restart was more costly. “You know, the talk, and what transpired on our radio, for the No. 11 car, (Hamlin’s crew chief) Chris [Gabehart] told me that it was close to 50/50 on whether to go inside or outside. I wanted to choose the outdoors. I didn’t tell him anything, but I wanted to chose the outside because it felt like I was, you know, in a green-white-checkered situation, the P3 person usually splits three-wide bottom. That’s exactly what happened to me.
“I’m on the bottom, and he told me, the key moment for me was when he said, the No. 5 car, by the numbers, probably will choose the outside. And so at that point, I’m like, ‘Good. I don’t want Kyle starting behind me.’ I know he’s going to split three-wide. Whoever he splits three-wide, is going to go backwards, really quick.”
Evidently, Larson’s positioning made all the difference, but Hamlin was still wondering what could’ve been if he chose the outside instead last weekend.
“I would’ve absolutely rather have chosen the outside, and gotten the push,” Hamlin added. “Now, if Larson was to choose the outside behind me, he likely would’ve tried to split me, if he wanted to start fourth to the outside. But I feel like, it’s easier to defend the right side than it is the left side, with the apron and everything that’s going on. So lesson learned, for sure.
“You just kind of put this one in the notebook of like, remember this. Remember these decisions, and certainly there was one, Daytona 500, back in 2017. I had control of the green-white-checkered, and chose the wrong lane. Certainly, I chose the wrong lane, this time, as well.”
Alas, NASCAR will return to Kansas Speedway later this season. You can bet Denny Hamlin has this one tucked away in his mind, ready to use what he’s learned if the situation ever arises again for the
No. 11.
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