Denny Hamlin Denny Hamlin won’t be looking online to find out when NASCAR Nextel Cup practice starts again any time soon. He will stick to the sheet given to him by his Joe Gibbs Racing team. He overslept Saturday morning and missed the first 30 minutes of Nextel Cup ractice at Infineon Raceway. How did he do that?

“I went online and looked to see when practice was and it said, ‘12 o’clock,’ ” Hamlin said. “Of course, that’s Eastern [time] not Pacific.” His team tried for an hour to get in touch with him, finally reaching Hamlin at 8:59 Pacific time, one minute before the session started. Hamlin got to the track about a half-hour later, got about 20 minutes of practice, did part of the second practice and then left for Milwaukee, where he was late for the Busch Series race because his helicopter wouldn’t land. He wound up getting in his car on lap 59 and won the race with Aric Almirola, who started the event, getting the victory.

“I got a phone call [at] my hotel saying, ‘Practice is one minute,’ ” Hamlin said after the win in recounting his morning. “I try to do the best I can to serve both teams correct and try to do the right thing. I dropped the ball. “I was amazed they were able to get through [to] me when they were or I would have just missed everything - both practices and this race. It was a bad day [logistically] all around.”

Scene Daily

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11 Responses to “Hamlin sleeps in, screws up”  

  1. 1 George Thompson

    Of all the stupid things to do

  2. 2 Andy

    Haha, that’s unfortunate.

  3. 3 Sara, MI

    what a dork… you would think he would have some kind of wakeup call!

  4. 4 mare

    hells bells & god save the queen!! seems kinda
    funny to get important info offline that pertains
    directly to your own lively hood, the welfare of
    your team & good old fashion responsibility.

    wouldn’t it have made more sense
    to atleast ask the crewchief?

    nobody’s faut about the helicopter…
    really had to be stressful already being late!

    either way…when I’m late for work I have this
    hurry hurry hurry feelin all day—

    ya’ll think that may have helped him push
    himself to victory lane??

  5. 5 gigolo george

    He should’ve stayed at a Holiday Inn Express.

  6. 6 Tracey

    THE BOY WAS TIRED LOL

  7. 7 Audrey

    He had a major blonde moment.

  8. 8 hot rod todd

    i think that everone above are all cool guys! they must have never done anything wrog. and never had that much on you plate to do. and they would never understand all the parts of the race not just what you read or see on tv there is so much more to it than that.

  9. 9 Ben

    Stuff happens.

  10. 10 HoppyGirllllllll

    That’s exactly what I was going to post Ben! (Well, pretty close, anyway). Hell,
    everyone oversleeps sometimes. I bet he doesn’t do it again!

  11. 11 Jarrod

    Stuff does happen. It usually happens at the most inopertune time too. Hoppy, you’re right I bet it doesn’t happen again, at least not anytime soon. Poor guy was living in 2 to 3 time zones in the weekend, hell I would get confused too. But what a way to finish off a crappy day!!

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