Denny Hamlin Warns RFK About NASCAR Appeal: “It’s Not a Fair Fight”

What’s Happening?

NASCAR team owner and driver Denny Hamlin says that RFK Racing is facing an uphill battle with their appeal of a penalty handed down to Ryan Preece following his run-in with Ty Gibbs at Texas Motor Speedway.

Last week, NASCAR surprisingly fined and penalized RFK Racing driver Ryan Preece for what they deemed an intentional wrecking of Ty Gibbs.

After the race at Texas Motor Speedway, fans agreed that it was iffy whether or not Preece, who continues to maintain his innocence in the matter, touched Gibbs as the No. 54 came down on the nose of the No. 60 in turns three and four.

Therefore, the ruling from NASCAR, which cost Preece $50,000 and 25 points, faced harsh criticism from the NASCAR community, with fans, drivers, and legends all pushing back at NASCAR.

With the support of the community on their side, RFK Racing opted to appeal the penalty, saying in their announcement to do so that they look forward to presenting “our findings” to the National Motorsports Appeals Panel.

While they may have the support of fans and drivers, one name in the Cup Series garage who is familiar with the appeals process, driver and team owner Denny Hamlin, was quick to warn RFK about the process.

During the latest episode of his podcast Actions Detrimental, Hamlin said that the appeal hearing with the NMAP is “not a fair fight.”

Specifically, from his experience, Hamlin claims, it’s hard to challenge what NASCAR says during these hearings, whether what NASCAR claims to the NMAP’s independent panel is true or false.

“You can’t rebut anything. . . When they [NASCAR] start giving their explanation to this independent panel, there is no, ‘I object, that’s not true.’
You can’t say that; you have to sit there and let them say whatever they want to say. The process is not a fair fight for the ones that are appealing.” — Denny Hamlin

Does Denny Think RFK Has a Shot?

Despite this uphill climb for RFK, Hamlin did say that he thinks RFK has a real shot at getting this penalty overturned.

For one, he finds it interesting that in NASCAR deciding not to fine Kyle Busch for his run-in with John Hunter Nemechek that same weekend, they cited SMT data for their reasoning, suggesting that could favor the case of RFK and Preece.

“I think he has a legit shot of getting it overturned, just based off of facts and evidence, but, interestingly, they’re now using SMT as a comp for evidence,” Hamlin said. “When I brought it up, they said, ‘Oh, SMT is a very non-scientific way of looking at things. We don’t put a lot of faith in that.'”

One piece of evidence levied against Preece is his communications leading up to Gibbs’ spin, saying under caution prior to the wreck, “When I get to that 54, I’m done with him,” and going on a lengthy rant afterward.

Hamlin says that this is just commonplace among drivers, that they “say that all the time.”

Overall, he thinks that NASCAR’s decision to penalize the No. 60 was shocking and that it was not in the best interest of the sport.

“I would rather them just not penalize anyone and just, this just not been a story overall,” Hamlin said. “I think that would have been in the best interest of the sport.”

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