{"id":82694,"date":"2025-07-22T08:19:11","date_gmt":"2025-07-22T08:19:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/82694\/"},"modified":"2025-07-22T08:19:11","modified_gmt":"2025-07-22T08:19:11","slug":"denny-hamlin-proposes-next-step-in-nascar-in-season-challenge-motorsport-sports","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/82694\/","title":{"rendered":"Denny Hamlin proposes \u2018next step\u2019 in NASCAR In-Season Challenge – Motorsport – Sports"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Championship Round of the inaugural NASCAR<\/a> In-Season Challenge<\/a> is on the horizon with Joe Gibbs<\/a> Racing\u2019s Ty Gibbs in the No. 54 Toyota set to take on Kaulig Racing\u2019s Ty Dillon in the No. 10 Chevrolet at Indianapolis Motor Speedway on Sunday.<\/p>\n

Considered the brainchild of JGR\u2019s Denny Hamlin<\/a>, the In-Season Challenge has seen the top 32 seeded drivers as of Nashville go head-to-head each week in the hunt for the $1 million prize to be awarded at Indianapolis. The Cinderella story throughout has been Dillon, who has survived to reach the Championship despite entering as the lowest-seeded driver.<\/p>\n

The 33-year-old reached the final two by narrowly besting John Hunter Nemechek in the No. 42 Toyota for Legacy Motor Club, finishing one spot ahead of his rival in 20th at Dover in the Autotrader EchoPark Automotive 400<\/a>. However, while Dillon\u2019s fairytale run has provided plenty of entertainment throughout, among other storylines, Hamlin believes there is room for improvement should NASCAR run it back next season.<\/p>\n

Hamlin praised NASCAR for how the format has been implemented on Kevin Harvick’s ‘Happy Hour’<\/a> podcast following his recent win at the Monster Mile, adding that overall he has \u201cbeen very happy with it\u201d and believes it has been \u201ccompelling.\u201d The 44-year-old, who has a Cup Series high four wins this season, did, however, suggest changing the opening race should NASCAR run it back with the Challenge next season.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don’t know necessarily from an entertainment standpoint, do you want to knock out all your favorites and super speedway race right off the bat that pretty much trashes everyone’s brackets?\u201d he asked, referring to the mass wreck in the first round in Atlanta<\/a> which wiped out multiple favorites such as Hamlin himself, Joey Logano, and Chase Briscoe.<\/p>\n

\u201cLike we’re not even talking about brackets anymore, right? It’s more talking about these head-to-heads. So if I were in charge, that’d be the next step is kind of refining the tracks in which that you have in it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite this, Hamlin was generally upbeat about the Challenge, noting how it has been \u201cgreat for people like Ty Dillon, that otherwise, there’s no way we’d be talking about him in really any way, shape or form over these last four or five weeks, but he’s managed to upset the favorites that he’s been going against. And so it’s created those storylines.\u201d<\/p>\n

Not only has the Challenge created plentiful storylines, but it\u2019s also meant something to the likes of Dillon, who told TNT Sports<\/a> it had been \u201cone of the biggest things that I\u2019ve done in my career.\u201d<\/p>\n

Looking back at his battle with Nemechek, Dillon said, \u201cI had so many texts from friends and family last night and today just saying that they were praying for me and so I had this sense of ease the last couple of laps, like somethings going to go our way, a door’s gonna open and I\u2019m gonna step through it, and thats really kinda whats happened [through] this whole thing.<\/p>\n

DON’T MISS:<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cAnd I don\u2019t know why it\u2019s happening this way, but we\u2019re on a hot streak and hopefully we\u2019ll keep one more round here against young Ty.\u201d<\/p>\n

In five Cup Series starts at Indianapolis, Dillon has finished each race between 21st and 13th, while his only Xfinity Series victory came at the historic track back in 2014. As for 22-year-old Gibbs, this will be just his second Cup Series start at Indianapolis, having crossed the line 23rd last season. He is yet to run the race in the Xfinity Series.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Championship Round of the inaugural NASCAR In-Season Challenge is on the horizon with Joe Gibbs Racing\u2019s Ty…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":82695,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[46],"tags":[11130,52998,4423,1406,18935,62,52999,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-82694","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nascar","8":"tag-denny-hamlin","9":"tag-indianapolis-motor-speedway","10":"tag-motorsport-section","11":"tag-nascar","12":"tag-nascar-in-season-challenge","13":"tag-sports","14":"tag-ty-dillon","15":"tag-united-states","16":"tag-unitedstates","17":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114895910632989767","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82694","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=82694"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82694\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/82695"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=82694"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=82694"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=82694"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}