Skip to main content
Join Now
NASCAR Logo

Denny Hamlin sides with Dale Earnhardt Jr. on Austin Cindric COTA penalty

Brian Jones Profile Picby: Brian Jones03/11/25brianjones_93
Austin Cindric (7)
Mar 2, 2025; Austin, Texas, USA; NASCAR Cup Series driver Austin Cindric (2) during the EchoPark Automotive Grand Prix at Circuit of the Americas. Mandatory Credit: Jamie Harms-Imagn Images

Denny Hamlin agrees with what Dale Earnhardt Jr. said about Austin Cindric‘s penalty at COTA. On the Actions Detrimental podcast, Hamlin shared his thoughts on the Cindric hooking Ty Dillon at COTA and sided with Earnhardt, who said the loss of 50 driver points is more severe than a suspension.

“I think if you probably look at Austin Cindric’s performance history, I bet you he probably averages 25 points a race. I think it’s two races’ worth of him not being there,” Denny Hamlin said. “That’s a great point by Dale. It’s probably worse than a suspension.”

Before Hamlin shared his thoughts on Cindric losing 50 driver points, he weighed in on the incident itself. “I think the punishment probably fits the crime in this case,” Hamlin stated. “Does it follow the rulebook 100 percent? I don’t know. But to me, he had to pay a price for what he did, and he even admitted that he did it on purpose.”

Along with losing 50 driver points, Cindric was fined $50,000 for hooking Dillon. Most fans wanted a one-race suspension because that was the punishment for drivers who did the same thing. But while appearing on the Hauler Talk podcast last week, Mike Forde, NASCAR’s managing director of racing communications, explained why Cindric was just fined and lost driver points.

Why didn’t NASCAR suspend Austin Cindric after the COTA incident?

“In this case, we did feel it was significantly different than the previous two,” Forde said. “And the reasons are, you look at it, it is at a road course (with) lower speed, tight confines to begin with and the result didn’t even draw a caution. Now, obviously, the caution flag doesn’t come out as quickly on road courses anyway, but that did not draw a caution. So, those were really the reasons why we chose to err on the side of letting him race this weekend in Phoenix.”

Forde added, “When I hit social media after this penalty is announced, my guess is that there’s going to be several people who’ll feel this is the wrong call, and it may not be the popular call. When we look at penalties, we do not really care how popular we are. We try to do the right thing here.”