Denny Hamlin explains what took place during meeting with NASCAR after Richmond finish

Denny Hamlin revealed he met with NASCAR after the controversial end to the Richmond Cup Series race on Sunday that saw Austin Dillon come away with the victory. On the Actions Detrimental podcast, Hamlin talked about the meeting which included Joe Gibbs Racing owner Joe Gibbs.

“I thought it was a cordial conversation. It was myself, Joe Gibbs, Heather Gibbs, Dave Alpern, Chris Gabehart, and we laid out kind of how we felt about it,” Hamlin said. “They said like always they’re going to look at it. Obviously said post-race that wherever the line is [Dillon] may have crossed it, if not he he’s about as close to it as possible. If you care about the integrity of the sport and you want to see us taken seriously, it would be hard to look away.”

During the final lap of the Cook Out 400, Dillon took out Hamlin and Joey Logano to win his first Cup Series race of the year. Hamlin and Logano have spoken out on Dillon’s actions, which then led to Elton Sawyer speaking out on the incident.

“Our sport has been a contact sport for a long time. You always hear, ‘Where’s the line, did someone cross the line?’ I would say the last lap was awful close to the line, we’ll take a look at all of the available resources from audio to video, listen to spotters, we’ll listen to crew chiefs and drivers and if anything rises to a level that we feel like we need to penalize then we’ll do that on Tuesday,” Sawyer told reporters after the race.

Denny Hamlin wants NASCAR to take action on Austin Dillon

Despite being wrecked by Dillon, Hamlin finished second and it’s the second time in three races he has earned a P2 finish. And while Hamlin knew Dillon was going to be aggressive during the final lap of the restart, he doesn’t like how he earned a victory.

“In a major sport because we like to put ourselves in an upper echelon of sports in the world, you have officiating for a reason,” Hamlin said. “I just don’t know why we’ve allowed it to get this bad over time. And I believe you have a responsibility as a sanctioning body to set an example not only for your competitors but the people coming through the ranks to say, ‘This is how we professionally race. This is how racing goes.’ … Let me ask a question: If this is not over the line, then what is over the line? … He did not try to make a corner. He just drove until he wrecked him [Logano]. Kept going until he wrecked him.”