The weekend started off badly in qualifying as Hamlin could be found slogging around the track, over two seconds off the pace. He landed himself a start at the very back of the grid for Atlanta. His team immediately went under the hood, choosing to replace plug wires. The same change was made to his Joe Gibbs Racing teammates Martin Truex Jr. and Ty Gibbs in a proactive attempt to avoid the same issue on race day. They too, would start from the very back.
But while Truex and Gibbs marched to the front on Sunday, Hamlin remained at the very back. At first, it seemed as though there may have been an issue with the No. 11 Toyota, but it was actually a part of the plan. He ended Stage 1 in 32nd place, and about 15 laps into the second stage, he willingly pulled out of line in favor of returning to the rear of the field.
"I don't like it, Chris," he radioed, speaking to crew chief Chris Gabehart. "I think they're gonna wreck."
However, it turned out to be a fairly clean race for Atlanta standards. There were no accidents during the second stage, which saw Hamlin once again choose to make no forward progress. As the laps ticked away, over 30 cars were still running and on the lead lap. Hamlin had no choice but to try and cut a path to the front, but at that point, it was going to be a difficult task.
“I thought at the very end we got the Mavis Tire Camry kind of where it needed to be, but by then, you were kind of dealing with a log jam of a couple of lanes that are kind of blocking things and you couldn’t go much of anywhere, so I just tried to avoid the wrecks," Hamlin explained later. "I was trying to get 20 points out of the day. That was my goal — just get 20 however we could, obviously, starting in the back didn’t help with that. We did the best we could."
A day avoiding wrecks ends in a wreck
The big wreck finally did happen -- on the final lap, and Hamlin himself was collected. He crab-walked his damaged car across the line, finishing 24th and collecting only 13 points.
“Just saw cars turning sideways in front of me," he said of the incident. "Tried to avoid wrecks all day and just got in the last one.”
Hamlin leaves Atlanta 11th in the championship standings, just two points above the cut-line. However, the disappointing weekend didn't really faze the driver of the No. 11 JGR Toyota.
“No, not really," he said when asked if he was concerned. "I did what I wanted to do and that was lay in the back most of the race, and try to see what attrition came about, again – 20 points seemed really possible, but came up a little short of that today.”
The mentality behind the strategy
In his defense, the final two races of this round are Watkins Glen, where he finished second last year, and Bristol, where he won just a few months ago. His teammate, Truex, chose to race from the back at Atlanta, and ended up getting in a wreck that left him with just four points. It was an overly-cautious strategy that would have looked great if the race showed the same kind of attrition we saw earlier this year, but it just didn't happen.
On Monday, Hamlin spoke more about it on his podcast, Actions Detrimental, explaining that the data and analytics played a major role in his decision to ride for most of Sunday's race. In the spring Atlanta race, he led 15 laps but brought home a similar result, finishing 23rd and scoring just 14 points.
Nonetheless, the driver who won the race was one who chose to take all the risk and battle up front from green flag to checkered flag -- Joey Logano. Hamlin may not be worried, but any misfortune over the next two weeks could now spell the end of his title run before it even got the chance to really begin.
