NASCAR and Denny Hamlin finally found a way to get along, even if it’s just for a week.
Hamlin announced June 12 that due to the birth of his baby boy, he would skip the NASCAR Cup Series race at Autodromo Hermanos Rodríguez this weekend to support his family. Ryan Truex will pilot the No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota this weekend in Hamlin’s place.
First off, congratulations to Hamlin and his fiancée Jordan Fish. And kudos to Hamlin for being there for his family. There was a time in NASCAR when a driver wouldn’t even consider skipping a race just to be there for a childbirth. I’m glad those days are long past, as Hamlin absolutely made the right call here.
Of course this is going to hurt his shot at a regular-season title and the 15 playoff points that come with it. After all, he enters Mexico City third in points, 82 behind first-place Kyle Larson.
However, missing a race doesn’t hurt a driver as badly as it did in the Latford point system, ran from 1975-2010, when 43rd place was awarded 34 points. Now, if a driver finishes 35th or worse, they earn just one more point than a fan sitting on the couch. Connor Zilisch, for example, missed the NASCAR Xfinity Series race at Texas Motor Speedway earlier this year due to injury, and he’s currently fifth in the standings.
Hamlin isn’t a great road course driver. In the Next Gen era, he only has one top 10 on that track type, though it was a second at Watkins Glen International, a track he has raced on his entire career. In his last five road course races, his best finish is 14th (Charlotte Motor Speedway ROVAL) with two finishes outside the top 30. If there was any weekend for Hamlin to miss, it was this one.
Regardless, Hamlin will still be in the mix for the regular-season title. And thanks to his three wins, there’s still plenty of playoff points to make a run at that elusive first championship.
That’s the most important factor here: He will still get a spot in the playoffs and a shot at the title. It’s a decision where NASCAR deserves credit, its rules making clear Hamlin will get a playoff waiver and he will keep the playoff points earned in the regular season.
This won’t be a situation like when Larson missed the Coca-Cola 600 last year due to a rain delay in the Indianapolis 500. NASCAR gave no answer in that moment to whether Larson would be given a waiver or not. He finally was granted one, but that came after weeks of not knowing.
Entering this year, NASCAR tightened up its waiver policy to hurt someone in Larson’s boat, as even if they were to get a waiver, they would lose all playoff points for missing a race. But the series was forthcoming and transparent in what would and wouldn’t qualify for a waiver where a driver keeps or loses playoff points. Missing due to a childbirth was listed as an exception that would allow a driver to keep their playoff points.
NASCAR made this decision knowing that both Hamlin and Tyler Reddick, two people involved in the NASCAR vs. 23XI/Front Row Motorsports lawsuit, were both expecting babies this year. I know that’s a weird detail to bring up, but it must be mentioned given how NASCAR has treated those it was mad at in certain instances throughout its history.
So with everything Hamlin already had to worry about this week, he never once had to wonder if he was throwing away a championship chance by missing this race. Credit to NASCAR for doing the right thing on that aspect of the waiver policy.
It seems like such a trivial thing to applaud NASCAR for, but it wasn’t that long ago when missing a race for childbirth would keep a driver out of the playoffs. In 2014, Paul Menard skipped practice and qualifying in a March race at Auto Club Speedway. Menard made it back for the Saturday practice and the race, but according to longtime spotter Joel Edmonds, Menard would not have been granted a playoff waiver had he missed the race.
“… They [NASCAR] wouldn’t even grant Paul Menard one to see the birth of his child, and his family was spending $50 million a year on the sport,” Edmonds posted on X.
Menard made it to the race, and he finished 21st in points without a win anyways, so ultimately, none of it mattered. But if Menard had qualified for the playoffs and if Edmonds is correct in that he would’ve been denied a waiver, that would’ve been such a bad look for NASCAR back then. Thankfully, NASCAR’s decision on waivers for this year prevented a potential PR nightmare like the Menard incident could’ve been.
Right decisions were made by all around this week, but still, it feels so weird to say that a NASCAR policy actually helped Hamlin for once. The two have feuded so much over the years that Hamlin literally named his podcast Actions Detrimental because of all the times he was awarded that penalty. And he’s even earned the penalty from stuff he said on said podcast (when he admitted to intentional contact with Ross Chastain).
Hamlin has feuded with NASCAR Racing Communications Managing Director Mike Forde on X. This year, NASCAR started its own podcast called Hauler Talk, with Forde co-hosting, and though no one involved would admit it, sometimes the show feels like a platform for NASCAR to fire back at whatever criticism Hamlin gave on his podcast. And fans get all of this back-and-forth-ing for free. Isn’t that incredible?
The NASCAR-Hamlin feud has escalated all the way to the courts for this ongoing charter lawsuit, and regardless of how the case turns out, there is going to be even more bad blood between the two parties. I mean, how could there not be?
Yet even with all of this going down between Hamlin and NASCAR for all these years, it all stopped this week for the slightest moment as the two finally saw eye-to-eye on an issue. Even if that topic was something as simple as missing a race due to childbirth.
Michael Massie joined Frontstretch in 2017 and has served as the Content Director since 2020.
Massie, a Richmond, Va., native, has covered NASCAR, IndyCar, SRX and the CARS Tour. Outside of motorsports, the Virginia Tech grad and Green Bay Packers minority owner can be seen cheering on his beloved Hokies and Packers.