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Denny Hamlin and Chase Elliott have a history in the NASCAR Cup Series. The pair added a considerably different and much more friendly chapter during the July 20 qualifying session at Indianapolis for the Brickyard 400, and it was all the result of a lost piece of paper.
It happened after both drivers had completed their initial qualifying runs, advanced, and waited to make their top-10 qualifying laps. NBC’s Kim Coon caught up with the Joe Gibbs Racing driver and asked him what had happened with the Hendrick Motorsports driver just moments before.
“And then finally we saw an exchange between you and Chase (Elliott) on pit road of something. What was that?” the reporter questioned.
“Man, a stand-up guy,” Hamlin said of Elliott. “I guess one of the 2311 guys dropped a piece of paper out of their back pocket that had some information on it and he handed it to me to give to those guys.”
As Hamlin spoke, the broadcast aired footage that showed a pair of Tyler Reddick’s crew jogging the opposite direction and just after they passed the 2020 champion, he bent down, turned behind to see where the paper came from, then picked up what appeared to be a note card and handed it to Hamlin who was conveniently standing just a few feet away.
Chase Elliott and Denny Hamlin Battle for the Brickyard 400 Pole
Several minutes after Elliott returned the piece of paper with proprietary information to Hamlin, both drivers strapped into their cars for their final attempts at winning the pole.
The three-time Daytona 500 champion was the fifth of 10 drivers in the second round of qualifying around the 2.5-mile iconic circuit and posted a time of 49.589, which positioned him at the top with five cars remaining.
Four cars later and ninth out of 10, the No. 9 car hit the track and narrowly outpaced Hamlin with a time of 49.504. However, in a twist of irony, the 10th and final driver in the second session was Tyler Reddick. The No. 45 pilot zipped around the track and when he crossed the finish line had posted the fastest time of 49.469 to win the pole.
Chase Elliott and Denny Hamlin Have a History
The stand-up move by Elliott with Hamlin comes a little over a year after an ugly incident at Charlotte in the Coca-Cola 600 when the HMS driver didn’t like a move by the No. 11 pilot and responded by intentionally hooking him, sending his Toyota hard into the wall at high speed. NASCAR handed down a one-race suspension the following week to the No. 9 driver.
But that wasn’t the first time the two were at odds with each other. That occurred in 2017 when Elliott was leading the fall race at Martinsville with three laps remaining and appeared destined for his first career Cup win. However, Hamlin, who was on the rear bumper of the No. 24, drove into the rear of the car, and sent it up the track into the wall.
On the cool-down lap after the race, Elliott showed his displeasure and sideswiped the JGR car several times. But that was just the beginning. Several moments later, the young driver confronted the veteran in a heated exchange.
During the heat of battle and emotions running high, drivers do and say things out of character. They’re human.
At Indianapolis during qualifying for one of the biggest races in the sport, the two showed that despite being fierce competitors, they’re also respectful of each other and their respective teams.
And that’s something nice to see.
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