MARTINSVILLE, Va: Denny Hamlin thought making a pit stop to prepare for NASCAR overtime would benefit him in the green-white-checkered finish in Sunday’s Cook Out 400 at Martinsville (Va.) Speedway.
Unfortunately, Hamlin was the lone car inside the top-10 to decide to pit, and he found himself 10th on the restart for the two-lap shootout to the checkered flag.
On the restart, Hamlin found himself mired in race traffic and unable to make gains moving forward despite having new tires to maneuver back into the top five.
When the checkered flag waved at Lap 415, Hamlin had slipped outside the top-10, finishing 11th to Chase Briscoe, nearly two-tenths behind the Stewart-Haas Racing driver.
Before the questionable decision to pit, Hamlin hunted back-to-back wins in the NASCAR Cup Series.
Last weekend, Hamlin won the Toyota Owners 400 at Richmond (Va.) Raceway in a controversial finish. The Joe Gibbs Racing driver was accused of jumping the final restart.
The chatter about the finish at Richmond intensified as the week progressed; however, Hamlin attempted to shake the chat with the third win of the season but instead settled for his fifth top-15 finish of the 2024 NASCAR Cup Series season.
After the race, Hamlin explained the team’s late-race decision.
“We were just trying to do anything we could to steal one (win) with our Sport Clips Toyota,” said Hamlin. “We needed so many cars to do it – even still – the tires didn’t wear enough to matter.
“We saw when Joey (Logano) stayed out on those 80-lap lefts and led most of the stage. Tires didn’t wear, and we just struggled to pass all day. Once I came out of that cycle – third or fourth – that’s kind of just where I stayed.”
Hamlin admitted that he was hoping that more cars would join him on pit road when the final caution waved with two laps remaining, however, he said the team was determined to stick to their strategy no matter what.
“We were just trying to make a call there to drag some others down with us, but with the tire wear not being much of anything, it was probably a stretch to think others were going to pit with us, but that was our strategy,” Hamlin told reporters on pit road after the race.
“We knew we weren’t going to win. We were trying to do anything we could to win and so Chris’s strategy is were not going to win if we restart fourth on old tires, so pit and try to drag seven, eight cars if we could possibly do that. Nobody else pitted. Everyone with old tires just finished up front. We did all we could.”
A week after his Joe Gibbs Racing pit crew delivered him his second win of the season on Easter Sunday, this weekend, his time on pit road wasn’t quite as quick which cost the Chesterfield, Va. native some spots on the race track throughout the 415-lap race.
Hamlin attributed the slower stops to engine mapping issues.
“I’m not really sure,” said of his green flag pit stop. “We certainly had some engine mapping issues coming to pit road that really slowed down how well I did on pit road. We gotta look into that.”
Heading to Texas Motor Speedway next weekend, Hamlin is third in the Cup Series standings, 17 points behind Hendrick Motorsports’ Kyle Larson.
Follow Chris Knight on X (Twitter) @Knighter01 or email at cknight@catchfence.com.
