"A product of the Next Gen": Denny Hamlin calls aggressive driving the need of the hour in NASCAR for separation
Denny Hamlin opened up on the aspect of track position and parity in NASCAR in the Next Gen era. Ahead of the playoff race at Homestead, a journalist remarked to the JGR veteran that it's difficult to maintain a long streak of success in the current era.
He mentioned how in 2021, William Byron had 11 straight finishes inside the top 10 between his win at Homestead and a fourth-place finish at Dover, along with the example of Kyle Larson, who has the speed but gets into wrecks as well.
Hamlin was asked whether being aggressive is now a need of the hour in NASCAR because of how difficult it is to build consistency.
"Yes, I think it is hard. Track position is more important than it's ever been so it’s really hard for the fast cars to show they’re fast until they get there. Sometimes they never get there. So the field gets mixed through ill timed cautions, things like that, once you get buried you never know," Hamlin described. [10:20]
He recalled how a moment from last Sunday's race in Las Vegas, when, while he was running 15th, he saw Ty Gibbs and Kyle Larson running for the lucky dog. But neither driver could go anywhere with it because it was "just log jammed."
"I think that just really puts more emphasis on the execution of the race and making sure you don’t make any mistakes to lose track position now more today than ever.
"So that’s it’s hard for that to happen week after week after week especially with the different variations of the racetracks, so I just think it’s probably a product of the Next Gen. it’s going to be survival in the sense of just ‘don’t take yourself out,'" he added.
Denny Hamlin admitted that he hasn't done a good job of surviving but argued that the #11 team has gotten away with some finishes they didn't deserve, which goes to show how difficult it is.
Hamlin mentioned that in the Next Gen era, all cars are even, and drivers have identical driving styles, which makes passing tough, because of which aggression is the need of the hour to separate oneself from the others.
Denny Hamlin's crew chief slams Next Gen era for its lack of superstar supporting racing product
After the playoff race at Bristol, which saw Kyle Larson winning in one of the most dominating displays of all time in NASCAR, Denny Hamlin's crew chief Chris Gabehart didn't have nice things to say about the Next Gen car.
Gabehart said that the current car is 'too easy to drive', because of which all the drivers are 'too close', and because of that, the racing product cannot be any better. The crew chief said that the top, bottom, and middle at Bristol were all good. But the problem was that all drivers were separated by "point 0."
"These are the world’s best stock car teams and drivers. If you don’t give them enough ways to separate themselves, that’s what you’re going to see," Gabehart added.
With that said, it will be interesting to see how the next short track race, at Martinsville, plays out. Will it be a repeat of Bristol where one driver would dominate the entire field? Or will the new tire compound play a factor in the proceedings?