Denny Hamlin apologized on Friday for making two mistakes involving former Joe Gibbs Racing teammate #22-Joey Logano last weekend at Bristol Motor Speedway. The first mistake was bumping Logano too hard on lap 349 in retaliation for the way the Penske Racing driver raced him earlier. The bump sent Logano into a spin when he was battling Jeff Gordon for the lead and ruined any chance he had of contending for the victory. The second was for attacking Logano personally after a post-race shoving match between the crews that began when Logano approached Hamlin at his car. On the first mistake, Hamlin said he was trying to send Logano a message with a tap after Logano pinched down on him too hard earlier. "I felt bad, and really if you could watch my in-car camera you could see how frustrated I was to see he had damage to his car,'' Hamlin said before the first practice at Auto Club Speedway.
"I banged the steering wheel because I was, 'Man, I didn't mean to do that.' '' Hamlin said that gave the impression he was trying to "bully'' Logano, which he was not. Then came what Hamlin called "the big mistake.''
"At the end of the race I shouldn't have degraded him as a driver,'' he said. "It's not my job to say who's good or bad in our sport. That part probably should have been left out.''
Hamlin and Logano haven't communicated since a battle of words on Twitter Sunday night. Logano indicated the issue that began at the Daytona 500 with Hamlin criticizing his driving wasn't over. "I feel like I've told him everything I can tell him,'' Logano told ESPN.com earlier in the week. "I've got nothing to say.'' Hamlin considers the issue over because they haven't talked. ESPN