NASCAR approves overtime restart from Denny Hamlin at Richmond: ‘It was awful close’

So, what do fans want NASCAR to do? These are one of those areas where the sport just isn’t built to hand out penalties and disqualifications at the end of the race for a restart violation. This is not F1, and that just isn’t how officiating goes in this sport.

Let’s say NASCAR found an issue with how Denny Hamlin conducted that restart – do they give him a time penalty? Hold the field and do the restart again after making Hamlin serve a penalty? Then fans would complain that they altered the finish of the race that way.

This is another example of no good answer. Except, I think, the best answer was to just leave things as they were. Just as NASCAR decided to do.

Denny Hamlin wins in overtime at Richmond

So, in just three weeks Denny Hamlin has two wins. Throw in his Busch Light Clash victory and this has been a good year so far for the 11 team. They are killing it on these short tracks, and they’ve done it in very different ways each time.

While the overtime restart was exactly what Hamlin needed and he was lucky to get it, give him credit for being where he needed to be. He wasn’t one of the fastest cars all night. He had to adjust and make changes.

Things could have played out differently. If Larson gets spun a lap later, then Truex wins under caution. If Denny Hamlin gets DQ’d or penalized for the restart – Logano is the winner.

Folks are going to be talking about this one come morning. Hamlin wins another controversial race. Larson is somewhat involved. Tell me if you have heard that story once or twice in the last year? What did you think of the race? Should NASCAR start being more heavy-handed in race control decisions at the end of races?