Hamlin still thinks NASCAR throws questionable debris cautions

Hamlin not backing off show business claim

SONOMA, Calif. — Denny Hamlin did not back off last week’s insinuation that NASCAR sometimes calls caution for debris just to liven up a race.

Hamlin led by almost 10 seconds last week at Michigan when NASCAR called a debris caution with 15 laps remaining. Although he still won the race, he said after that the caution was because “this is show business.”

Asked about it Friday at Infineon Raceway, he didn’t change his stance and explained that NASCAR often uses debris cautions to bunch up the field and make the race more exciting.

“There is always debris around the track,” Hamlin said Friday at Infineon Raceway. “You can call anything debris. You could say that anything is debris and that it is a legitimate safety hazard, but I just think it’s the timing. ‘OK, there it is, let’s pick it up and regroup.’

“For the sake of show, that’s OK, but for the sake of competition, it’s not always the right thing. But, if we weren’t talking about that last week, if NASCAR had let it go, people were going to be talking about a boring race, and that’s something we don’t want, either.”

NASCAR has maintained there was debris on the track Sunday, and runner-up Kasey Kahne said he saw it.

Because TNT was in commercial when the caution was called, viewers at home were not shown any debris. However, those using TNT’s online application at the time did say they saw the debris under question.

Regardless, the fuzziness over those timely — or, in Hamlin’s case, untimely — caution has often infuriated race fans who believe NASCAR manipulates races with bogus debris calls.

Kahne complained about a call last year at California that cost him a good finish, and Tony Stewart in 2007 claimed NASCAR was more like professional wrestling because of its use of race-manipulating cautions.

Hamlin said the actual debris is not really in question, but rather NASCAR’s timing can be suspect.

“I think that they are (legitimate), but I think that sometimes they just don’t throw the caution,” he said. “There is always debris that they could throw a legitimate caution for, but I think that sometimes they just kinda let it go when maybe things are getting mixed up, and other times, when things are spread out, it’s ‘let’s tighten it back up.’

“You don’t have to be so smart to realize that these things are just by chance.”