“You’re Not Gonna Win”: Denny Hamlin Sides With Ryan Blaney’s ‘Moron’ Rant After Predicting the FRM Star’s Muckup

Ryan Blaney was in contention to win the USA Today 301 race at New Hampshire Motor Speedway last weekend. However, an aggressive move by Michael McDowell on a late restart ended his hopes for a potential win or a runner-up finish. Despite starting on the front row, the No. 34 didn’t have the best of launches, and Blaney on the outside lane also got a better launch. In a desperate bid to keep his second spot, McDowell just sent it in and rammed into No. 12, resulting in a caution.

Now it’s no secret that the Penske star is a hot head inside the race car. As soon as he spun across the racetrack after being bumped by McDowell, he didn’t hold back from expressing his frustration via the team radio. “He bombed it in there like a moron.” Siding with the Penske star, Denny Hamlin shared his take on the late race wreck, stating that he knew what was coming on the restart as soon as he knew that the 34 was on the front row.

Denny Hamlin’s spidey sense kicks in once again at Loudon

The JGR star somehow has honed the skill of predicting the wreck during the races. Remember on the Netflix documentary where he spoke about his intuition of a bad wreck during the Daytona race that caused the horrifying crash involving Ryan Preece? Back then, he decided to bow out of the aggression to avoid the detrimental action of a wreck, and guess what?

Hamlin was right. While he wasn’t in the thick of the action in this instance, once again he called it out even before the incident unfolded. Although McDowell argued that he was going for a win and had to make a bold move to stay in contention, Hamlin didn’t agree with his stance. Denny said,“You should play my radio before we went green. When they told me that the 34 was on the front row with the 20, I literally said, Oh, I see this one coming, and then the first corner, caution’s out, 34. ahh.. Saw that one coming.”

“I thought if he was gonna crash, it is because he drove in on the 20. Then the explanation to me though of well, I got to do everything I can because I’m in this situation… you are not gonna win the race from third.” Hamlin said on the Action Detrimental podcast episode aired on July 24.

Denny Hamlin further explained a rather sensible approach by McDowell to making that aggressive move. “So you gotta get around Blaney cleanly and then go ahead and make a bonsai move on the 20 go right ahead … Very low percentage move and it wasn’t the move to win the race. It was for second place. You gotta get to the second before you can make a crazy move.”

The good thing was that McDowell apologized for his mistake and even had a peaceful chat with Blaney after the race. Had the Penske star not won the race at Iowa Speedway, things could’ve gone downhill, but it was resolved quickly.

Playoff qualification pressure got the better of the FRM star

With eight races to go in the regular season, the playoff race is certainly heating up. As things stand, McDowell sits 22nd in the points standings, 71 points shy of the cutline. It is indeed hard to see him make it to the next round purely based on points. And with uncertain and damp racing conditions at Loudon, the driver felt it was his shot to go for the win at all costs.

“I was just explaining that I was in a do-or-die situation. I had to go for it.” McDowell said this in an interview with Bob Pockrass. “So I hate it for Blaney, and I know it ruined his day and ruined my day too, and I apologized to those guys for that. But I’m at a point in the season where I have to go for it, too. So you don’t know until you get there, and I was just in there a little too deep.”

It will be interesting to see if Blaney returns the favor to his fellow Ford driver in the upcoming races. Hopefully, this is not the case, as it will only add to his troubles and push him further away from making it to the last 16.