Denny Hamlin declares NASCAR fans “lacks faith in the competition leadership”

JGR star driver Denny Hamlin highlights the aftereffect of NASCAR leadership ignoring the complains from the garage.

Denny Hamlin declares NASCAR fans “lacks faith in the competition leadership”

Denny Hamlin (David Crigger/Bristol Herald Courier via AP)

The 2025 NASCAR Cup Season so far has been a year of mixed emotions for the racing fans. While some of the races this year has been impressive, others didn’t meet the expectations. The disappointment was predominately due to the passing and aero issues with the Next-Gen cars. Seeing all this, JGR veteran Denny Hamlin feels the fans might no longer has faith in NASCAR leadership.

The Joe Gibbs Racing veteran in the recent episode of his podcast Action Detrimental tried to give NASACAR a reality check with his words. He highlighted how the senior official Elton Sawyer admitted publicly that he doesn’t understand what needs to be fixed in the superspeedway package after the Talladega race.

The Dega event wasn’t as impressive of a race like sawyer boasted, highlighting the 67 lead changes as the only great thing about it was the clean event that saw not a single “big one.” But the momentum off clean race was ruined last Sunday at Texas with multiple wild wrecks. Denny Hamlin feels all these cost NASCAR credibility, reduce their morale and diminishes their faith in the leaders of the sport.

When you had Elton [Sawyer] go on last week talking about Superspeedway racing and say, ‘I don’t understand. What do we have to fix?’ Look at the stats that we got for this week. We had 67 lead changes,’ and whatever else, I think you lose some credibility with the fans. I think the fans have a low morale right now due to their lack of faith in the competition leadership.

Denny Hamlin said via Actions Detrimental.

Denny Hamlin highlights the issue with NASCAR’s transparency

Further talking about the point, Hamlin highlighted that the sports leadership in a tough spot and should consider cancelling such public comments via radio. It’s hilarious to see these words coming out of Hamlin, as he is someone who has urged NASCAR to be more transparent.

Denny Hamlin
Denny Hamlin (Via IMAGO)

I think it’s a tough position they’re in, but I think that they should just probably cancel the whole coming on the radio. I know why they’re doing it, I know why NASCAR comes on every Tuesday morning and says, ‘Let me tell you why we did this and why we did that.’ I appreciate that transparency from them.

Denny Hamlin said.

He appreciates this transparency, but believes NASCAR is doing them a disservice by coming in radio shows every week and making statements that ignores the complains of the drivers as well as fans, to make themselves good. He accused NASCAR of making stats up to claim Superspeedway racing isn’t bad.

But when you go in there and you kind of brush off what every driver said and has said for quite some time with the superspeedway package, go back three years’ worth of podcast. I’ve said we’ve got a superspeedway problem and we’ve kept ignoring it. I just think that NASCAR created its own stats to make itself look good.

Denny Hamlin added.

The comments from the Joe Gibbs Racing veteran shows the frustration regarding NASCAR lack of action regarding the car issues many in the garage shares. The sanctioning body needs to step up and find a solution, before the fans gets fed up with the state of the sport.

Also Read: Josh Williams urges NASCAR to remove in-field grass at Texas Motor Speedway