Denny Hamlin reveals thoughts on controversial NASCAR ruling

Denny Hamlin has spoken out about the end of NASCAR Cup Series race at Richmond, where he was involved in a controversial ending.

Ahead of this weekend’s race at the same track, Hamlin reflected on last year’s race which was won by Austin Dillon, who intentionally wrecked both he and Joey Logano.

Dillon was kicked out of the playoffs because of the way he won the race, with Hamlin revealing his thoughts one year on.

“It’s disappointing from my standpoint, but I wasn’t going to win the race anyway,” Hamlin said.

“I had about a one-second period where I was supposed to win, and the other time I was not. It wasn’t like the race that I had here in ’08 where I led the entire race, and then you don’t end up winning. Those are a little harder than the ones where it’s like, ‘I’m going to win! Oh, no, I’m not'.

“It’s just wild. It’s wild how it all turned out and to hear all the radio back. Now looking back on it, it was just a wild moment.”

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Hamlin further elaborated how important NASCAR's decision was, in order to set a precedent for future incidents.

“I think NASCAR drew a line in the sand and said that was too far,” Hamlin said. “I think they’ve been better about drawing the line in the sand on certain things like the right rear hooks we’ve seen over the last year.

“They are not afraid to make hard decisions, and I think that’s very, very important to the governing of the sport in general, so it’s not a circus. So, I do feel a little bit better about it now than what we did 12 months ago.

“I think that was the first time we’ve seen something like that happen, and NASCAR then had a precedent to set in the sense of what do you do from here?

“If you let that go, then you certainly open up just a floodgate of crazy things that could happen that would be bad for the relevance of the sport and the legitimacy of the sport.

“So, I think everyone probably has a little better understanding now because of the ruling. Not saying I agree with it or disagree but you certainly have a better understanding.”

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