Denny Hamlin Reflects on Superspeedway Strategy Call That Backfired

During stage one of the race, Hamlin led for nearly 42 laps of the race.  He was out ahead in a single-file group after battling it out three-wide in the early part of the race. However, Hamlin made the call to pit early.

And as he pointed out, that undid the lead. Going into the pit road, Hamlin was hit with a speeding penalty ( a pass-through penalty), that sent him tumbling down the pack. He ended up finishing 15th.

Drivers are no stranger to this chaos, especially at Talladega. And we saw this when Chase Briscoe was also hit with a safety violation going into the pit stall and served a similar penalty.

Later, as Denny Hamlin explained, there’s one major problem at superspeedways like Talladega that cause strategy related problems.

Denny Hamlin Opines on the Problems With Racing at Talladega

During the race at the Talladega Superspeedway, most drivers complained about one thing, and it was the minimal passing that took place on track. Denny Hamlin has voiced his opinion about the same.

In the aforementioned podcast, Hamlin said, “We’re running all out vs. guys that are running half throttle. Because they can use our draft. They don’t have to run that throttle. Again, the air that gets punched by this car is so massive, and they’re so draggy that all it takes is a little bit of a sniff, and you can just run half throttle right behind someone that’s running all out. That’s part of the problem. Then the other part is you cannot pull out of line because of the drag.”   

The strategy plays a huge role at Talladega, and the most common strategy chosen by the team is that of fuel saving. This strategy at times helps the teams go to the end of the race. However, this at times makes for a dull race.