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Denny Hamlin breaks down No. 11 team's struggles ahead of Coca-Cola 600

Brian Jones Profile Picby: Brian Jones05/20/25brianjones_93
Denny Hamlin (50)
Peter Casey-Imagn Images

Denny Hamlin broke down the issues the No. 11 team has had ahead of NASCAR’s Coca-Cola 600. On the Actions Detrimental podcast, Hamlin detailed the mechanical issues the car has had over the last few weeks.

“The mechanical stuff, you can’t be worried about carrying over,” Hamlin said. “You just do what you’re able to do as a driver, right? The mechanical stuff is something that I can’t control. The last two weeks, we had that.”

Hamlin then talked about the qualifying race for the All-Star event. “I think if it would had gone more than 40 laps green, we would have gone a lap down,” Hamlin said. “We were the worst car, by a long way. To oversimplify it, we just miscalculated on our adjustments overnight. We didn’t miss it, we literally missed a decimal point when it comes to measuring things.”

Denny Hamlin talks about All-Star Race issues

Hamlin later said, “We should have still shown up closer than what we did. We missed it. It’s funny how the world and the universe kind of works. I was thinking this week, I was like, if everything can just stay together and I don’t have mechanical issues, I don’t have just something out of whack, running top five is the easiest thing in the world. I can’t remember the last time I had speed legitimately out of the top five. And then this week happened, and it was like, ‘Oh s**t.’ The world just needed to give me a reminder that this is not as easy as it seems.”

Denny Hamlin finished last in his All-Star Heat race, which led to him earning a 20th starting spot in the 23-car All-Star Race. When the All-Star Race was all said and done, Hamlin finished 12th and missed the opportunity to win the event for the second time in his career.

The last three races have gone well for Hamlin as he finished 21st at Talladega, 38th at Texas and 36 at Kansas. Those finishes came after he finished in the top five in four consecutive races. After 12 races this year, Hamlin has earned two victories, six top-10 finishes, five top five finishes and two DNFs.