Denny Hamlin gives his verdict on Chase Elliott’s performance shift: “He isn’t one of those guys that leads 100-200 laps”

Denny Hamlin lauded Chase Elliott after the latter fought through rain, late-race cautions, and pit-road drama to bring home a respectable P6 finish at Dover Motor Speedway on Sunday, July 20. Commonly known as “The Monster Mile”, the concrete one-miler hosted the Autotrader EchoPark Automotive 400, the 21st Cup race of the 2025 season.

Hamlin won the race by a margin of 0.310 seconds, while the top five spots were rounded up by Chase Briscoe, Alex Bowman, Kyle Larson, and Ty Gibbs. Subsequently, Elliott, Bubba Wallace, Ryan Blaney, Chris Buescher, and Brad Keselowski rounded up the top-10.

Hamlin was especially impressed with Elliott’s performance. Opening up on his Actions Detrimental podcast, the Joe Gibbs Racing driver said:

“Six weeks ago, he was 10th to 15th every week and then would finish in the top-10. And then now he's leading. A lot of it is there's been all of us guys at the top that had major issues, and Chase doesn't have those.”

Elliott led 171 of the first 184 laps en route to the Stage 1 win over Hamlin and his JGR teammate, Christopher Bell. Notably, it was his first time leading laps since July 2024.

“To me, it felt like one of his stronger performances,” Denny Hamlin added. “Chase isn't one of those guys that leads 100-200 laps in races. The box score will not say the real story, and that it was that the #9 car was the most dominant car for the first half of the race.”

Chase Elliott is now at the top of the leaderboard with seven top-fives, 12 top-10s, and 702 points. Thanks to his win at EchoPark Speedway, the Dawsonville native is locked in the playoffs. Denny Hamlin is there as well, sitting fourth with 663 points.

“It’s called racing”- Denny Hamlin discusses Chase Elliott's pit-road fracas at Dover

Chase Elliott completely dominated Stage 1 at Dover, so some fans thought he could even win the race. Right before the rain came in, the #9 driver was asked to pit from the lead to take a pair of fresh tires. But Denny Hamlin knew that it would not work.

There wasn’t a lot of tire wear all day, and the little corrosion that the tires took while running was manageable. But by committing to the pit road, Chase Elliott gave up precious race spots. Some fans say it’s his crew chief, Alan Gustafson’s, fault.

However, Hamlin said in a statement (via Yardbarker):

“That is so silly do. I get it. It’s always got to be someone’s fault why you didn’t win that day. But sometimes s**t just doesn’t work out. It’s called racing.”

Next up for the drivers is the Brickyard 400 at the iconic Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Scheduled for this coming Sunday, July 27, the 160-lap event will be televised on TNT Sports, 2 p.m. ET onwards, with live radio updates on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.

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Edited by Samya Majumdar