Denny Hamlin explains surprising engine failure during Chicago practice

Not even half a lap into the practice session for the NASCAR Chicago Street Race, and Denny Hamlin blew his engine out. The Joe Gibbs Racing driver was seen having some tough conversations with his competition team, including Coach Gibbs himself. Not a great result for this team early on in the weekend.

Denny Hamlin made it to Turn 4, and then his car gave out. He wasn’t even up to speed in his Toyota Camry quite yet. Still, the bottom of his engine fell out and he spilled oil all over the race track, causing a lengthy delay in practice.

Afterward, Hamlin spoke to Alan Cavana of TNT Sports. Hamlin was clearly frustrated.

“Yeah, don’t know. I just, uh, I hadn’t even hit the gas yet,” Hamlin explained. “Came off Turn 4, just started accelerating and blew the whole bottom out.”

When asked if it was the pre-race process that led to the failure, Denny Hamlin wasn’t ready to point fingers quite yet. But he doesn’t want to have to worry about these things as a driver.

“I just, uh, a lot of things you know, we want to be in control as drivers,” Hamlin said. “We want to be in control of our result. You don’t want to have processes or mechanicals stop you from that. And obviously this is a race track that is important to have reps and we spend hours upon hours prior, practicing and getting ready and all that stuff, and couldn’t even make a pace lap before you blew up.”

It is going to be a tough race weekend for Denny Hamlin and his team. Bouncing back from this engine failure will be more than difficult.

Denny Hamlin needs to stop bleeding before it starts

In his last four races, Denny Hamlin has three top-fives, including a win. But he is coming off a P31 DNF at Atlanta. Right now, Hamlin and his team have to stop the bleeding before it even starts. One DNF can turn into multiple. A poor result can linger. The 11 team can’t afford that.

With the win at Michigan, Hamlin put himself in position to really have a great end of the regular season. But this week and next week are out of his comfort zone. Then you add the engine failure already this week on top of that. I am not saying it will happen, but I could see Hamlin having a few disappointing results in the next two weeks at a crucial time in the season.

Momentum both good and bad is a very real thing in racing. Can Denny Hamlin overcome his engine issues and salvage his weekend in Chicago? It is hard to say right now, but we will watch and see on Sunday when he tries to do just that.