As of now, Denny Hamlin and his teammate Chase Briscoe are both already locked into the Championship 4 finale race at Phoenix. But before the title race, they’ll have to tackle Martinsville, while Joe Gibbs Racing contends with a growing concern. Mechanical gremlins are plaguing its cars.
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At Talladega, Hamlin battled a throttle issue caused by debris, forcing a lengthy pit stop under caution and pushing him down to 24th. Though the setback didn’t dent his championship hopes, thanks to his Las Vegas win that secured his Phoenix berth, it marked the second mechanical hiccup of his playoffs.
Earlier at Kansas, the #11 JGR driver came up an inch short of Chase Elliott after controversially pinching his own 23XI Racing driver, Bubba Wallace, into the wall. That move cost him speed, compounded by a power steering issue and a sluggish pit stop.
But since last year also, a stuck throttle in Martinsville practice dashed his hopes of reaching the Championship 4 altogether, now, with Phoenix on the horizon, Hamlin is wary.
Although Martinsville will serve as a battlefield for the remaining six playoff hopefuls, the No. 11 team has less than two weeks to iron out its recurring issues.
“Yeah, it’s really, really frustrating because we want our results dictated by our performance on the race track. Nothing would absolutely suck worse than to go to Phoenix and have a mechanical (issue) or something happen that takes away (my) opportunity to achieve (my) dream.”
He added, “We’ve had issues with batteries and starters and clutches, and lots, lots, and lots this year. I’ve had all three, and how should I word this … What if we hadn’t won (Vegas) and that was my championship hopes, and that is where my frustration lies. It’s not necessarily things that we put together that I would love to see us fix.”
Hamlin admitted he’s unsure whether the team can fully resolve the problems before Phoenix, saying, “I don’t know that we’re going to fix it in a couple of weeks, but I just hope it doesn’t play a factor when it really, really counts at the end of these races, especially the final race.”
Some fluky things have happened to Hamlin like a stuck throttle (Dega) and power steering (Kansas) issue and this is the anniversary of debris causing a stuck throttle at M’ville.
Gabehart says this isn’t a quality control thing. No concerns for Phoenix.https://t.co/kP8tpqLsHT
— Matt Weaver (@MattWeaverRA) October 20, 2025
Meanwhile, Chris Gabehart, Hamlin’s former crew chief and now JGR’s competition director, downplayed concerns about systemic issues while acknowledging the need for answers. “It is a little bit of a freak instance that we need to get to the bottom of, for sure. I don’t want to take it lightly, but it was not something as simple as a bolt coming loose or something like that,” he said.
For Hamlin, Martinsville offers one final chance to put his equipment through its paces before Phoenix. The stakes couldn’t be higher, because one more mechanical misfire could turn a dream season into a nightmare.
