Don’t be surprised if Denny Hamlin isn’t well-received by a big section of fans in Atlanta this weekend. Over the last few years, the rivalry between Denny Hamlin and Chase Elliott has had a few showings. There was their tussle at Martinsville five years ago, then there was Hamlin calling out Elliott’s fanbase booing him at the same track in 2021, and most recently there was their incident from the Coca-Cola 600 which saw Elliott getting a one-race suspension.
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But in leading up to Elliott’s home race in Atlanta this Sunday, the one thing, even more than these incidents that could be deemed the detrimental point in Hamlin not getting the love from the crowd, could be his recent comments on Elliott’s fans.
Denny Hamlin went off hard on Chase Elliott fans recently
After the incident in Charlotte, Hamlin demanded NASCAR park Chase Elliott for a race and suspend him. That ended up happening, of course, but Hamlin left no stone unturned in his quest to convince Elliott deserved a penalty for his actions on the track. The #11 driver even posted the data from the race to make his point on his Twitter and later claimed he wasn’t really afraid of any backlash he may receive from the fans of NASCAR’s most popular driver.
“I don’t mind Chase Elliott fans,” Hamlin said on his podcast. “Some of them are sane, most of them are not. Even when you got the Dawsonville Pool Room saying, ‘Oh boy, we need a substitute driver next week,’ you probably know you’ve f**ked up.”
“Dude, these fans. Golly, they drive me crazy sometimes because they’re so two-faced. And I look at specific instances, and I go back in their history, and they condone it when it goes on one side, and they ‘must suspend from NASCAR,’ when it’s on the other side. How can you be a fan and be that twisted to not recognize when your driver f**ked up? Even myself, I know when I’m absolutely an idiot, made a stupid f**king move.”
“How can you not be that self-aware? I just don’t get it. Just call a spade a spade for once, so you gain a little bit of credibility. So they’re looking, they’re like, ‘Well, his car obviously must have been broke. He would never do that.’ Why? Has he not before? I mean, I’ve given you instances where he’s lashed out being like a kid.”
Hamlin appreciated NASCAR for suspending Chase Elliott
Reacting to the announcement of Chase Elliott being suspended for one race after his Charlotte incident, the veteran driver applauded NASCAR’s decision, claiming, they are “putting a line in the sand” about what’s acceptable and what isn’t.
Hamlin also pointed to how his team handled the nearly identical incident of Bubba Wallace last year. “I publicly reprimanded Bubba for those actions last year,” Hamlin said as per FOX Sports and claimed it was “absolutely unacceptable”, and they, as a team, were very public about their thoughts on the move.
But while what Hamlin said about this subject may make sense to most, as it certainly did to NASCAR, what he said about Elliott’s fans might not have been a very pleasant thing to their ears.
So it’s not a stretch to imagine that this Sunday, they might make their point clear to Hamlin as their favorite driver hopes to get his first win of the season.
