Denny Hamlin breaks down crash with Erik Jones, Bubba Wallace that ended day in Geico 500

“I just saw the No. 43 get turned and then I got turned,” Hamlin told Regan Smith. “I’m really not sure which one happened first. Obviously there was a bad push towards the front and wiped us all out. It’s just poetic.”

The wreck happened during Stage 3 of the race at Talladega Superspeedway. Hamlin, Jones and Wallace were looking to make a late push to take first place, but instead all three watched the rest of the race from pit road.

Hamlin has had a lot of success at Talladega, earning multiple top-five finishes and winning races in 2014 and 2020. Before Sunday’s Geico 500, Hamlin finished in the top-five in two of the last three races, including a third-place finish last October.

Two consecutive crashes for Denny Hamlin

This is the second consecutive week Hamlin crashed during the late stages of the race. Last week, Hamlin wrecked during the final laps at Texas Motor Speedway, leading to Chase Elliott getting his first win since the 2022 season.

“I thought that — I’m like, second is not bad. I was thinking that as I was sitting in my pit stall, and them banging hammers on the back of my car. I’m thinking, ‘Yeah, second really would have been nice today.’ Listen, I saw this wreck coming five minutes before it happened,” Hamlin explained on his Actions Detrimental podcast.

“As we’re running, I mean, that’s my job as a driver right, is to think about all the scenarios, and what it’s going to take to win the race. And I’m thinking my first job is, I need to get a good restart and be beside them in turn one and two. Second job is, I need to be totally beside him entering turn three, so we need to be nose to nose. If I’m behind him, he’s gonna wash up, and then I’m in a bad spot. So I thought about all the scenarios, and I thought about, ‘Well what happens if I’m not ahead?’ I said, ‘You know what, I’m just going to trust it. I’m gonna sack up here, and I’m going to try to run higher than I did all day. I’m going to try it.’”