NASCAR: Denny Hamlin's aggressive pass of Kyle Larson earns him another Pocono win

Denny Hamlin got his second win of the 2023 NASCAR Cup Series season Sunday at Pocono.

Hamlin made the winning pass on a restart with less than 10 laps to go when he dove to the inside of leader Kyle Larson as the two barreled through Turn 1. Larson hit the wall on the exit of the corner as Hamlin completed the pass into Turn 2 before Justin Haley crashed to bring out another caution.

Shortly after the caution flag flew, Larson drove into Hamlin’s door on the frontstretch to show his displeasure with the way that Hamlin raced him.

Hamlin then easily held onto the lead with three laps to go on the final restart and was out in front of Tyler Reddick and Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Martin Truex Jr. when the caution flag flew on the final lap for Ryan Preece’s stalled car. Preece spun on the penultimate lap, but NASCAR held the caution. He was unable to get going between Turns 2 and 3 before the leaders approached on the last lap.

Hamlin was loudly booed by many of the fans in attendance after he climbed from his car and he defended his pass of Larson amidst the noise.

"There was a lane," Hamlin said in his victory interview. "He missed the corner first and evidently he didn't have his right-side tires clean and when he gassed it up he kept going again. You have an option in those positions to either hold it wide open and hit the fence, or lift and race it out. But those are choices they made. I didn't hit either one of them."

Hamlin was using a plural noun because the caution that set up his winning restart pass came from Alex Bowman's crash. Bowman went spinning in Turn 3 from third place ahead of Hamlin, and while Hamlin was close to Bowman's bumper before the No. 48 car went around, it didn't appear via replay that Hamlin touched Bowman's car.

The win is the 50th of Hamlin's career and his seventh at Pocono. The 2.5-mile triangular track is his best track as he’s finished in the top 10 in 22 of his 34 starts there.

Kyle Larson: ‘I am pissed’

Larson ended up finishing 20th after he fell through the field in the closing laps — likely because of the damage to his car. As you can imagine, he was not thrilled with his friend, Hamlin.

“I’ve been cost a lot of good finishes by him throughout my career and I know he says I race a certain way, but I don’t think I’ve ever had to apologize to him about anything,” Larson said. “So, not that I’m sure he’s going to say sorry after this, but it is what it is. Whatever, just move on.”

Larson then expounded on how the incident on the track affected the relationship between the too.

“Yes, this makes things s***** and awkward, whatever,” Larson said. “He’s always right. All the buddies know, Denny’s always right. I’m sure he was in the right there as well. It is what it is. I’m not going to let it tarnish a friendship on track, but I am pissed. And I feel like I should be pissed.”

Larson was in position for the race win after he caused a caution himself on lap 45 of the 160-lap race. Larson's car backed into the Turn 1 wall shortly after a restart after contact from Christopher Bell entering the corner. The damage was minimal, but Larson lost a ton of track position.

He got it back through the last green-flag pit stop cycle of the race. A two-tire pit stop before both Hamlin (two tires) and Truex (four tires) made their final pit stops put Larson ahead of both drivers. He did a fantastic job staying ahead of the Toyotas while the race went green before Chase Briscoe got spun by Ty Dillon with less than 20 laps to go.

Austin Dillon throws helmet at Tyler Reddick

Austin Dillon may regret his helmet throw at Tyler Reddick on Sunday.

Dillon crashed out of the race on lap 105 when he slammed hard into the Turn 1 wall. Dillon was in the middle of a three-wide situation and moved to the inside while Tyler Reddick was alongside. The contact with Reddick then sent Dillon into the wall.

After climbing from his car, Dillon took off his helmet and flung it at Reddick’s car under caution. After leaving the infield care center, Dillon blamed Reddick for the crash, even though replays showed that Dillon was the one who moved down into Reddick while Reddick held his line. Dillon said that he "felt like I was holding my own" and claimed that he had the right to hold his lane.

Dillon then said he needed to "start wrecking some people" given the aggressive driving in the Cup Series. It was quite the quote from a driver who wrecked Aric Almirola to win the 2018 Daytona 500.

Highpoint.com 400 results

1. Denny Hamlin

2. Tyler Reddick

3. Martin Truex Jr.

4. Kevin Harvick

5. Ty Gibbs

6. Christopher Bell

7. Ricky Stenhouse Jr.

8. Harrison Burton

9. Erik Jones

10. Chase Elliott

11. Bubba Wallace

12. Aric Almirola

13. Ross Chastain

14. William Byron

15. Todd Gilliland

16. Brad Keselowski

17. AJ Allmendinger

18. Chris Buescher

19. Michael McDowell

20. Kyle Larson

21. Kyle Busch

22. Noah Gragson

23. Austin Cindric

24. Alex Bowman

25. Cole Custer

26. JJ Yeley

27. Corey LaJoie

28. Ty Dillon

29. Chase Briscoe

30. Ryan Blaney

31. Ryan Preece

32. BJ McLeod

33. Justin Haley

34. Austin Dillon

35. Joey Logano

36. Daniel Suarez