Denny Hamlin explains why easing off Ross Chastain at Charlotte wouldn't be 'race manipulation'

Denny Hamlin essentially had control of who would advance to the Round of 8 of the NASCAR Cup Series playoffs between Ross Chastain and Joey Logano. The only problem for Hamlin is he wasn’t aware of the points battle on the final lap of Sunday’s Round of 12 finale at the Charlotte ROVAL.

Driving blind to what was going on around him, Hamlin passed Chastain, who was fighting his car around the racetrack. That pass meant that Chastain and Logano were now tied on points. Logano owned the tiebreaker on Chastain. Hamlin was upset his team never notified him of the situation. Had he known and decided not to pass Chastain, would it have been race manipulation? He doesn’t believe so.

“There’s obviously two reasons I would want to know,” Hamlin said on Monday’s Actions Detrimental podcast. “One is if these guys are battling, it would give me a much better understanding to prepare if I’m going to attack the 1. I need to know that he’s going to be really aggressive blocking. That could have been a simple message. It then allows me to say to myself, ‘Who do I wanna race?’

“It’s not race manipulation if I’m trying to get the best result for me. I got no allegiance to Ford, Chevy, Joey, or Ross, but I have interest in myself winning a championship.”

Most would argue that given the choice, Hamlin would rather race against Chastain than Logano going forward in the playoffs. Logano is a three-time Cup champion and winner of two of the last three championships. Hamlin said it wouldn’t have been as cut and dry.

Denny Hamlin reveals last lap strategy had he known points situation between Ross Chastain, Joey Logano

“You can argue which one you would want to race,” Hamlin said. “I think that I still go out there and try to pass the 1 because I think the 1 has a better shot of getting to Phoenix. I think the 22 has the better shot of winning Phoenix. So, I can’t win Phoenix unless I get there first. It’s not a given that I want to race Ross over Joey. Ross would have a better shot of keeping me of getting to Phoenix than Joey would, in my opinion, on pace. I look at the tracks, I say yes, Joey has been strong on superspeedways. Look at the numbers, he’s finished inside the top 20 one time in the Next Gen era. It’s not a given. They both have the same amount of playoff points.

“So, had I known, I probably would have thought about it, and I don’t know what I would have done. But I certainly would have thought about it, and all those things would have crossed my mind. They crossed my mind Saturday night. Given the situation, who do I want to advance? And I thought the same thing, ‘Well, the devil you know or the devil you don’t. One could make my path to Phoenix harder, one could make the Phoenix race harder.’ That’s the balance you just don’t know. But I know for sure that had I known and had I made the decision don’t pass the 1, do you know how bad I would kick myself in the ass if the 1 kept me out of the final four? My mental would be gone.”

Logano got the final transfer spot over Chastain, who tried to pass Hamlin on the final corner but ended up taking both of them out. Hamlin didn’t fault Chastain for the aggressive move on the final lap.

“I don’t fault Ross at all,” Hamlin said after the race. “I just wish I knew so I could have been either prepared or made a different decision. I didn’t even hear anything from the spotter about, like, closing or anything. “I didn’t know anything about anything going on. Obviously, the 1 was in a position there, and, obviously, we got caught in it.”