NASCAR: Denny Hamlin ready for Pocono but ‘not over’ New Hampshire

In an interview with FanSided’s Mark Carman, Denny Hamlin stated that he is ready for this weekend’s NASCAR Cup Series race at Pocono Raceway, but he is “not over” what happened at the end of last weekend’s race at New Hampshire Motor Speedway.

Joe Gibbs Racing’s Denny Hamlin had a chance to secure what would have been his third victory of the 2019 NASCAR Cup Series season by winning last Sunday’s race at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, but he couldn’t get the job done.

How the 38-year-old Chesterfield, Virginia native fell short of winning this race and collecting the five playoff points that would have come along with it has been a major talking point over the course of the last week.

Hamlin, a 33-time race winner at NASCAR’s highest level, will be unveiling a special FedEx Cares / Safe Kids Worldwide paint scheme on his #11 Toyota that morning to help raise awareness about distracted walking and distracted driving. He will race the special car at the Sunday, August 4 Cup Series race at Watkins Glen International in Watkins Glen, New York.

Driving a backup #11 Toyota after wrecking his primary car in practice for the 301-lap race around the four-turn, 1.058-mile (1.703-kilometer) New Hampshire Motor Speedway oval in Loudon, New Hampshire, Hamlin ran down race leader Kevin Harvick of Stewart-Haas Racing on newer tires, and on the race’s final lap, he tried to move his #4 Ford out of the way in turn one.

Hamlin did slightly get ahead of Harvick, but Harvick was able to battle back and take the preferred inside lane in turns three and four en route to taking the checkered flag to secure his first victory of the season by just 0.210 seconds over Hamlin in second place.

Here is how this race ended.

Hamlin spoke to FanSided’s Mark Carman about the thrilling finish of this race earlier this week, and while he stated that he is ready for today’s race at Pocono Raceway, he is still “not over” what happened to wrap up this race since he knows he could have done more to move Harvick out of the way to win it.

Here is what he had to say about it.

"“I’m ready for Pocono, but I can tell you, no, I’m not over last week for sure about that. I think it’s kind of a double-edged sword. If you go out there and you get more aggressive, you end up having to deal with the consequences down the road.“Certainly I wanted those five playoff points and I wanted another win, but I think that we’re running fast enough right now that it could come this weekend. We are extremely fast and we’re really competitive every week, so I’m not going to get too bent out of shape out of last week because I know we can to this week and win again.“I think if it was another driver that doesn’t get that opportunity very much, he definitely would race it differently, but I had to be smart and try to do it the right way. That way I ensured myself a chance at a championship later on.”"

Hamlin was effectively in a position where he could make Harvick his enemy moving forward by winning a regular season race and scoring five more playoff points or he could give up the chance to win and score those five playoff points while not putting Harvick in a position to ruin his chances of winning a championship later on.

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With the long run in mind, he took the latter.

Hamlin has run well this season like he stated, but he has been largely overlooked since he has lived in the shadows of teammate Kyle Busch and Martin Truex Jr., who have each won a series-high four races so far this season.

He notably opened up the season with his second Daytona 500 victory at Daytona International Speedway in mid-February. He also won the race at Texas Motor Speedway in late March, and he sits in fourth place in the championship standings.

Hamlin is a four-time winner at Pocono Raceway, the site of today’s Gander RV 400, although he hasn’t won a race at the track since the 2010 season. He qualified for this 160-lap race around the three-turn, 2.5-mile (4.023-kilometer) oval in Long Pond, Pennsylvania in a respectable 12th place. Harvick, meanwhile, is set to start from the pole position.

Will Denny Hamlin redeem himself from last Sunday’s finish at New Hampshire Motor Speedway with what his fifth career victory at Pocono Raceway this afternoon, which would tie his highest win total at any track on the NASCAR Cup Series schedule? Tune in to NBC Sports Network today at 3:00 p.m. ET for the live broadcast of this race.