Denny Hamlin believes ‘everyone’ is more physical in All-Star Race

Denny Hamlin understands that the NASCAR All-Star Race is a little more physical than other races due to what’s at stake. On the Actions Detrimental podcast, the 43-year-old explained why drivers are okay with the physicality of the exhibition race.

“Everyone understands that this race is a little different,” Hamlin said. “You can be a little more physical I believe in the All-Star Race. I don’t know that everyone says that, but I think that everyone abides by that.”

The physicality was on display at the start of the race as Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and Kyle Busch ran into each other. It led to Stenhouse wrecking his car during the second lap, and the two got into a fight once the race was over.

Hamlin was physical when he needed to be but came up short in the race, losing to Joey Logano. On the podcast, Hamlin explained why he finished second in the race. “We pulled away there at the very end. I thought we definitely had the two fastest cars,” Hamlin said about racing Logano. “I would get close, and then dare we say it, aero. I just couldn’t get any closer than about two car lengths. The cars, they just don’t like air.”

Denny Hamlin just misses $1 million prize, loses to Joey Logano

The winner of the All-Star Race gets $1 million, and that plays a big part in the drivers being physical. During the post-race press conference, Logano talked about being worried about a car getting into his as he was leading the race.

“Well, anything can happen. It’s a race,” Logano said. “Like anything can happen at any point. How many times have we watched NASCAR races where we think someone has got it in the bag? I see it all the time in the FOX booth over the Xfinity races, I think this guy has got it won and then all of a sudden are you kidding me, like the most bizarre thing happens. Luckily for us none of that happened today.

“Honestly, our toughest moment was racing the Gibbs cars because their cars were very opposite of ours, which hey, the 54 was at the test here, too. It fired off fast, fell off hard. That’s what the 20 did, and then also the 11 where he was able to fire off really, really good, pressure me for 15 laps, and then it would fall off.”