As the NASCAR regular season winds down, Bubba Wallace finds himself in a precarious position concerning the upcoming playoffs.
Despite displaying notable improvements on the track, his recent P6 finish at Daytona was overshadowed by competitors like Harrison Burton, who secured a surprise victory which put him into the playoffs.
With the cut-off line looming, Wallace's chances appear increasingly fraught.
Denny Hamlin shared his insights on Wallace's situation during an episode of his podcast, "Actions Detrimental." He commented, as quoted by On3.com:
"It's not sour grapes on my end that the 23 team's in this spot. It's just, man, I'm liking at least what I'm seeing when it comes to the performance now.
"This is good, acceptable performance. I hate that it's came so late in the game, but they're on it right now. They're running well."
He continued:
"I think that how suited you are to some tracks and the schedule does play a role and a factor, but I do think that maintaining intensity for 36 weeks is very, very hard.
"It's extremely hard. But it's what the elites do. The elites prepare every week, whether it's a good track or a bad track or a medium track. It doesn't matter, you prepare the same, with the same intensity, and you go out there and you give it your all.
"It's just very, very hard for people to do that because you've got other s*** going on in your life.
"Trust me, I know. I'm torn in 18 different places during the week, but I always make sure that I give my job my A1 job. I give it my 100%. I never want to leave any stone unturned when it comes to being a racecar driver, because that's the shortest runway of career I've got left. But it's hard to do.
"Sometimes it's not because of effort. It's just because the pit crew needs time to gel and the driver/crew chief relationship needs time to gel, and you're building notes and rule changes over the offseason and you don't adapt to them well.
"That's all part of it. But the elites, man, bring it every single week and they overcome when s*** goes down on the racetrack. They come back for a great finish."
As it stands, Wallace is 21 points shy of the playoff cut-off. His pathway to a spot in the playoffs hinges on an extremely strong performance in the upcoming Cook Out Southern 500 at Darlington Raceway this coming weekend.
About the writer
Lydia Mee is a passionate motorsport journalist with a background in covering Formula 1, NASCAR, electric vehicles, and other various ... Read more
