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In his first interview since his injury at Auto Club Speedway driver Denny Hamlin said he hopes to return two weeks earlier than the six week period his doctors mentioned previously.
The Virginia-born native is aiming to return to racing by the spring race at Richmond International Raceway. There are two obvious reasons, first it's his “home” race track and second he wants and needs points to make NASCAR's playoffs called “The Chase.”
Denny Hamlin, 32, who drives for Joe Gibbs Racing, said “I'm being very optimistic and I'm not following orders, but I'd like to be back in it at ... Richmond would be a target week I'd love to get back in the car. I think it would be a great thing to be at my home track and back in the car, but obviously it's a little sooner than the timetable set for me. I'm going to physically feel fine. Unfortunately there's things going on inside my body that aren't going to allow me to get in the race car until they're ready.”
In a television interview on SpeedTV the driver didn't appear in any discomfort. “I feel not completely back to normal but I at least can walk around and be a little bit more mobile,” said Hamlin. “I'm past the physical hurdles that this injury has given me. It's just now the mental of not being able to get in the race car for the next six weeks.”
He was asked to explain about his ongoing feud with former JGR teammate, Joey Logano, who tangled with him on the closing lap of Auto Club Speedway.
“I ultimately spun him out at Bristol,” Hamlin said of the incident the week before. “I did not intend to spin him out. It was a mistake. I said it was mistake. Said I was sorry on the radio when it happened. That was in retaliation to being chopped off twice and it frustrated me and I intended on bumping him, and then I did and it spun him out. He crammed us on the restart and it made our day bad. Blew a tire and we finished 25th. In my opinion, he retaliated at Bristol, and it was over at that point. I didn't realize going forward that it was going to continue. Obviously he still had a good finish and I ended up 25th and flying to the hospital.”
On Monday Logano said the last lap accident was not intentional; it was just hard racing. “Obviously I know who I'm racing against and what happened a week before but going into turn three on the last lap, I remember ‘I'm going to win the race.'” Logano said on television. “ My number one goal is to go win a race. So did I intentionally wreck him? No, I did not intentionally do that. If I was going to do that I would have hit him in the left-rear tire. I hit him in the door. It's hard racing at that point. I hate that he got hurt.”
In NASCAR custom following an incident at the track drivers may communicate with each other to short cut bad feelings. Apparently a text exchange between the two drivers was not satisfactory to end the feud.
“I'm upset that things just couldn't be let go,” added Hamlin. “We had a great opportunity at the end of that race to let bygones be bygones. I literally played out in my mind that if he wins this race, I was going to shake his hand right there on pit lane and congratulate him and tell him, ‘This is how we should be racing each other.' Unfortunately, it didn't play out for either one of us. I was upset that we had an opportunity to change how we race each other and he just didn't let it go.”
The Virginia-born native is aiming to return to racing by the spring race at Richmond International Raceway. There are two obvious reasons, first it's his “home” race track and second he wants and needs points to make NASCAR's playoffs called “The Chase.”
Denny Hamlin, 32, who drives for Joe Gibbs Racing, said “I'm being very optimistic and I'm not following orders, but I'd like to be back in it at ... Richmond would be a target week I'd love to get back in the car. I think it would be a great thing to be at my home track and back in the car, but obviously it's a little sooner than the timetable set for me. I'm going to physically feel fine. Unfortunately there's things going on inside my body that aren't going to allow me to get in the race car until they're ready.”
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| Caption: NASCAR.com |
In a television interview on SpeedTV the driver didn't appear in any discomfort. “I feel not completely back to normal but I at least can walk around and be a little bit more mobile,” said Hamlin. “I'm past the physical hurdles that this injury has given me. It's just now the mental of not being able to get in the race car for the next six weeks.”
He was asked to explain about his ongoing feud with former JGR teammate, Joey Logano, who tangled with him on the closing lap of Auto Club Speedway.
“I ultimately spun him out at Bristol,” Hamlin said of the incident the week before. “I did not intend to spin him out. It was a mistake. I said it was mistake. Said I was sorry on the radio when it happened. That was in retaliation to being chopped off twice and it frustrated me and I intended on bumping him, and then I did and it spun him out. He crammed us on the restart and it made our day bad. Blew a tire and we finished 25th. In my opinion, he retaliated at Bristol, and it was over at that point. I didn't realize going forward that it was going to continue. Obviously he still had a good finish and I ended up 25th and flying to the hospital.”
On Monday Logano said the last lap accident was not intentional; it was just hard racing. “Obviously I know who I'm racing against and what happened a week before but going into turn three on the last lap, I remember ‘I'm going to win the race.'” Logano said on television. “ My number one goal is to go win a race. So did I intentionally wreck him? No, I did not intentionally do that. If I was going to do that I would have hit him in the left-rear tire. I hit him in the door. It's hard racing at that point. I hate that he got hurt.”
In NASCAR custom following an incident at the track drivers may communicate with each other to short cut bad feelings. Apparently a text exchange between the two drivers was not satisfactory to end the feud.
“I'm upset that things just couldn't be let go,” added Hamlin. “We had a great opportunity at the end of that race to let bygones be bygones. I literally played out in my mind that if he wins this race, I was going to shake his hand right there on pit lane and congratulate him and tell him, ‘This is how we should be racing each other.' Unfortunately, it didn't play out for either one of us. I was upset that we had an opportunity to change how we race each other and he just didn't let it go.”