Bubba Wallace topped the charts to win his second career cup race and his first of the season at Kansas as he repeated the feat achieved by his teammate Kurt Busch in the spring race on the track. The win marked a second win for Wallace in his career as well as an impressive second win for the 23X1 Racing team this season.
The No:45 Camry driver was able to outrun his TRD teammates Christopher Bell, and Martin Truex Jr., and boss Denny Hamlin, who finished P2, all of whom finished in the top 5 along with Alex Bowman of HMS. Wallace was able to out-execute all of the above and kept his boss at bay in the final laps to secure a clean and normal win after the rain-suspended race in Talledega.
As a cup driver Denny Hamlin will be frustrated about his performance in the second playoff cup race of the season as the veteran once again dropped p2 to a non-playoff competitor, this time at the Kansas speedway. But at the same time as a team owner, he will be on cloud nine as his employee outraced him for an emphatic win, an emotion he shares with co-owner and NBA legend Michael Jordan.
Find out what Michael Jordan and Denny Hamlin said about Bubba Wallace’s win
Michael Jordon congratulated Bubba Wallace and the No:45 team and pointed out that he is now a proven winner saying “Huge congrats to Bubba Wallace and the entire 45 team for today’s great win. Bubba has proven that he is a winner with the 23 and the 45. Let’s go,”.
Denny Hamlin, in his post-race press conference, pointed out that Bubba Wallace suffered point-out trouble like most of the drivers in Kansas but he was able to get around the traffic faster than the others. He added that the advance from Wallace was the pivotal point of the race for him.
“I think a lot of people had a lot of issues on pit road. Certainly, we were one of many. But I saw [Bubba] in the back of the pack just like we were, and he was able to get through the traffic faster than I was. And so that’s the pivotal point of the race where I think that he’s really improved in the sense of that,” Denny Hamlin said.
Denny Hamlin went on to say that Bubba Wallace has earned the win just like he wanted it to be. He didn’t have any intention to yield the win to him while running second. He backed his claim by pointing at his pace in the last 20 laps and acknowledged that he lost the race because Bubba and No:45 team out-executed him.
“As I said in my interview post-race, there’s no way that Bubba ever expects me to give him anything. He doesn’t. He wants to know that he went out here and earned the win today. And it was not given to him. My lap times those last 20 laps prove that I was giving it every single bit that I had, but he just out-executed us, out track positioned us and our cars today,” Denny Hamlin added.
What are your thoughts on Bubba Wallace’s win?
Also read: “Shut the heck up for a lot of people,” Bubba Wallace wins at Kansas edging team boss Denny Hamlin
ncG1vNJzZmiemafAtb%2FPqKmtsl6YvK57zZqqnJmiYrumw9Jmn55lp5q7tXnOrqtmoJWnsm6tzZ1knpmio7KledOhnGavmaN6tbvDmrBmpZmYtaa4jKOmq5yRo3qiusNmm56mnq56qa3MpaCnZaKarqTAjK2mZpqll6%2Biedaao6WZk5rAbrfAp6qaq12stq97