“He’s Making the Right Choice!” Denny Hamlin Breaks Silence on Alex Bowman’s Retirement Announcement

Hendrick Motorsports veteran Alex Bowman has announced that he would retire from full-time racing after spending one last year with Hendrick Motorsports. He took the decision owing to his recent health/injury struggles as well as his commitment to his family. The racer retiring at the age of 33 was a major shock for many in the garage, as it’s the time many peaks in the sport.

Joe Gibbs Racing veteran Denny Hamlin talked about the announcement in the latest episode of his podcast and shared his farewell for the star racer. He highlighted how Bowman is one of the racers he respects the most in the garage and admitted that the No:48 Chevy racer wouldn’t have retired if not for his recent winless streak.

Alex Bowman retiring at the end of 2027. Yeah, farewell to Alex the hack. I say that in best because I got a lot of respect for Alex. I think if you’re winning a bunch of races, you you’re not retiring at 35 or 33 or whatever he is. Um, but you know, it just hadn’t been right.

Denny Hamlin said on his podcast.

Since the Next-Gen era, Alex Bowman has been struggling with injuries. In 2022 he had a concussion that sidelined him for five races, in 2023 he broke his back in a High Limit Series race, missed three races and this year was not behind the wheels for four races owing to vertigo. Not properly recovering from the back injury and recent health issues is hurting the veteran more than anyone expected.

It’s a non-sexy injury because people can look at you and you look totally fine but you aren’t. And um you know he went through some vertigo stuff too, right? You look normal. Nope. Can’t stand up straight. like it’s just he’s had some tough luck in the injury front and I gotta believe that it’s absolutely hurting performance.

Denny Hamlin added via Actions Detrimental.

Another major challenge has been the fact that so far in the 2026 season, the HMS cars failed to hit the mark. They haven’t found a way to win races and for a racer coming back from injury, not having fast cars that could get him the confidence back is a nightmare. That why Denny Hamlin feels Bowman made the right choice to step back and race part-time.

I mean, what do you do after running in a Hendrick car? Like that that doesn’t get better from there. So, I think that he’s making the right choice for him and he and he said he’s got some I don’t think he wants to stop driving. You know, he might drive something. Don’t know what yet. So, we wish him the best.

Denny Hamlin admitted.

Denny Hamlin explains how tough it is to recover from a back injury

In the same conversation earlier, Hamlin also talked about his own personal struggles with injuries and how it took him more than a year to get back to performing on his level after a back fracture. For racer that feels the cars around with their ass, not having a healthy back is a major challenge. Unfortunately for Bowman he seems to have not fully recovered from the 2023 injury.

He had that fracture to his back, the same one that I had, and it just never seems like the feel or something is… I just knew for me it took a year. It truthfully took a year for me to get right my feeling back to know where the car was at after that injury. It’s just because I tell the listeners all the time that the how we feel the car is right in our tailbone in our butt cheeks. And so, like you know when you break that it’s and it just it changes things.

Denny Hamlin said.

At the end of the day, Bowman made the right choices as he should not endanger his health at the age of just 33 for racing, as his family and people who loves wants him fit and spend many years with them. It would be interesting to see how the farewell season is going to playout for him and how he is going to perform in his pat-time racing career post-2027.

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