Denny Hamlin met with the media on Friday before NASCAR’s annual awards show in Charlotte. Less than two weeks removed from the 2024 Cup Series season when the No. 11 car made three trips to Victory Lane and finished eighth in the final standings, but surprisingly, the main topic of conversation wasn’t the recently completed year.
Instead, reporters wanted to know about the headline-making news of the day – his crew chief Chris Gabehart getting promoted to competition director at Joe Gibbs Racing and being replaced by Chris Gayle, who was crew chief with Ty Gibbs and the No. 54 this season.
Fox’s Bob Pockrass asked the three-time Daytona 500 champion how he felt about the decision and if he was hurt or mad, considering it appeared the duo had a good thing going.
“I was certainly shocked by it,” Hamlin admitted. “That’s all.”
But should he really be that shocked? The writing has been on the wall.
There has been a steady shift away from older to younger drivers at JGR since 2022 when M&Ms first left and Kyle Busch followed. Enter Ty Gibbs.
Martin Truex Jr. delayed retirement for a couple of years and finally called it quits from full-time racing this season. Chase Briscoe, who turns 30 in December, will drive the No. 19 in 2025.
Remaining are the 29-year-old Christopher Bell and Hamlin, who will not have FedEx as a sponsor next season. The 44-year-old won three times in 2024, but his last victory occurred at Dover in April.
However, the No. 11 car wasn’t the only team to struggle. Bell was the last driver from the entire four-car organization to win. He did it at New Hampshire – in June. In addition to not winning in the final half of the season, no JGR cars finished inside the top four for the first time in the playoff era.
With those struggles as the backdrop, JGR officials recognize Gabehart is undoubtedly one of the best crew chiefs in the Cup garage and believe his insight and expertise could better serve the company in a larger role as competition director, similar to the transition Chad Knaus made with Hendrick Motorsports in 2020.
Some of what Denny Hamlin said about the crew chief change and his surprise that Chris Gabehart is no longer his crew chief. Chris Gayle is taking over the No. 11 team. pic.twitter.com/4yaTisHoK7
— Bob Pockrass (@bobpockrass) November 22, 2024
Hamlin, as co-owner at 23XI Racing, should understand this move better than most. He knows what it’s like to make tough business decisions. It was less than a month ago that his organization announced Bubba Wallace’s crew chief Bootie Barker would be replaced by Charles Denike in 2025.
So as much as Hamlin may not have expected the decision, he had to think it might be a possibility simply due to the way the organization finished the 2024 campaign. And now that it’s happened, fans of the No. 11 have to think their driver is one step closer to heading out the door and becoming the latest casualty of the youth movement.
