{"id":263340,"date":"2025-11-05T12:52:11","date_gmt":"2025-11-05T12:52:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/263340\/"},"modified":"2025-11-05T12:52:11","modified_gmt":"2025-11-05T12:52:11","slug":"denny-hamlin-reflects-on-shock-of-losing-nascar-championship-believes-he-did-exactly-what-playoffs-asked-him-to-do","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/263340\/","title":{"rendered":"Denny Hamlin reflects on ‘shock’ of losing NASCAR championship, believes he did ‘exactly’ what playoffs asked him to do"},"content":{"rendered":"

Denny Hamlin spent nearly the entirety of Sunday\u2019s NASCAR<\/a> Cup Series championship race at Phoenix Raceway racing with Kyle Larson in his rearview. It wasn\u2019t until the white flag came out in overtime when he first saw Larson in front of him. <\/p>\n

At that point, Hamlin knew he was out of time. Larson was going to win the 2025 championship. In Hamlin\u2019s mind, he did \u201cexactly what the playoffs asked me to do.\u201d He dominated the race and wound up with nothing to show for it.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn my mind, I did exactly what the playoffs asked me to do,\u201d Hamlin said, via Jeff Gluck of The Athletic<\/a>. \u201cI can\u2019t remember, I think the first time \u2014 and no disrespect to them \u2014 I don\u2019t think I saw them [Larson and No. 5 team] until the white flag lap. I can\u2019t remember a lap where he was ahead of me at any point in the race. I remember seeing them for the very first time right after we took the white and the dogleg, I went down, I looked up and because they told me on the backstretch with two to go that the 5 is pinned on the outside. I thought he was one of the cars I was clearing in [Turns] 3 and 4. <\/p>\n

\u201cSo, when I saw him, that\u2019s when I knew then that it was over. I only had three-quarters of a lap to say, \u2018Oh my God, he\u2019s gonna win.\u2019 I think that\u2019s where the shock came from is just doing all the right things. I felt like I did my job everywhere and even beat everyone for most of, if not all, of the scheduled distance. But it just went longer, and unfortunately, on that last lap, I saw my fate right in front of me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hamlin started on the pole at Phoenix, leading a championship race record 208 laps. He was well on his way to his first championship before one final caution changed everything. <\/p>\n

William Byron\u00a0blew a tire and hit the wall, forcing NASCAR to throw the caution. Hamlin and the field came down pit road, the No. 11 team opting to give him four fresh Goodyear tires.\u00a0Larson\u00a0and five others went with two tires while others stayed out, creating a sizeable gap between the Championship 4 competitors. Hamlin didn\u2019t have enough time to catch Larson, who won his second championship.<\/p>\n

Where does Hamlin, who turns 45 later this month, go from here? He is under contract to race in 2026 but before he can even think about getting back inside a race car, he must first find a way to move on from this latest championship race heartbreak.<\/p>\n

\u201cI plan to, I have a contract to, but at this point, there\u2019s just absolutely no way that I would even\u2026 I don\u2019t even think about race car, right now,\u201d Hamlin said<\/a>. \u201cYeah, I\u2019m going to need some time on this one.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Denny Hamlin spent nearly the entirety of Sunday\u2019s NASCAR Cup Series championship race at Phoenix Raceway racing with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":263341,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[446],"tags":[49,48,634,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-263340","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nascar","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-nascar","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/263340","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=263340"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/263340\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/263341"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=263340"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=263340"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=263340"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}