Loyalty is everything, and Denny Hamlin hasn’t shied away from showing it. “I really appreciate Denny and everything he has meant to our organization,” said team owner Joe Gibbs, reflecting on Denny Hamlin’s recently announced multi-year contract. The 44-year-old has spent his entire 706-start Cup Series career with the organization, and he ranks as the longest-tenured and winningest driver in the team’s history.
As Hamlin doubles down on his commitment, questions arise about how his veteran presence shaped the careers of his younger teammates. Christopher Bell has recently weighed in on having a seasoned winner anchoring the team and what it means for their competitive futures.
“He’s invaluable,” – Christopher Bell about teammate Denny Hamlin
The love story started long ago. Denny Hamlin joined Joe Gibbs Racing in 2005, making his Cup series debut at Kansas Speedway and running his first full season in 2006. He earned Rookie of the Year honors, accumulated his first two wins at Pocono by season’s end, and ranked third in points, the highest finish for a rookie in modern-era NASCAR. Over two decades, he has become JGR’s bedrock, 58 wins, 7 crown jewel wins to his name, including three Daytona 500s, and unmatched consistency that led to 18 straight playoff campaigns and four Championship 4 appearances. The only thing missing from this resume is a Cup Series championship.
Enter Christopher Bell, who joined JGR in 2020, taking over the No. 20 Toyota. Since then, he has become a reliable contender, earning a championship 4 berth in 2022 and 2023, before narrowly and controversially missing out in 2024. His three consecutive wins in 2025 set the stage for dominance, but he has not won since. But multiple stage points and consistently scoring top 10 finishes keep him in a good spot for the playoffs. Now, as JGR committed to Hamlin’s future, Bell weighed in on having a veteran presence in the garage as he and fellow young stars like Chase Briscoe and Ty Gibbs build their careers.
Bell spoke to Frontstretch ahead of the Brickyard 400, saying, “I mean, I think it’s good to have that experience, and I think it’s awesome for Denny and JGR to continue their relationship. You know, he started his career there, and it would be awesome to see him end his career at JGR as well. He’s obviously been around a long time, and I’m happy to see that he got a deal done.”
AP Photo / Derik Hamilton
Denny Hamlin leads the Cup Series and wins with four victories in 2025, including his most recent at Dover. He currently sits fourth in the championship standings, proving his veteran consistency remains in elite form this season. However, their roles intersected dramatically at Dover as Bell spun twice, both while battling Hamlin for the win. Despite leading 67 laps and winning stage two, Bell’s efforts yielded an 18th-place finish after costly mistakes.
Owing to his inexperience compared to Hamlin, Bell complimented his teammates’ driving style, and even admitted to learning from the maestro at tracks like Martinsville, where Hamlin has 6 wins and a staggering 21 top-10 finishes. Christopher Bell added, “Denny’s driving style is just a lot different than most, and it’s very unique. He’s gotten to where he’s strong at every racetrack now, but certainly there are a couple of tracks where he’s super good, and he’s definitely helped me at a couple of them… I think back to the Martinsville test a couple of years ago, he’s the man at Martinsville, and he really helped improve my team by just me studying his data and him getting in the car and helping us work on the setup of the car, too. He’s invaluable. I mean, anytime you get a Hall of Famer as a teammate, it’s a big advantage.”
Despite his flowing praise for Hamlin, Christopher Bell seems to be in the crossfire, according to Kevin Harvick, after a chaotic Dover race. And now, Hamlin also had a few words to say.
Denny Hamlin on his duel with Bell at Dover
Denny Hamlin had the lead late at Dover, but the looming overtime restart meant his fourth win of the season wasn’t going to come easily. With drivers like Christopher Bell breathing down his neck and fresh tires on cars behind him, Hamlin had to calculate every move. The track had been damp from an earlier rain delay, and every driver knew certain sections, still holding slick patches, could make or break the finish. But it certainly wasn’t guaranteed; the fact that Hamlin had to rely on a little help from Bell to avoid a wreck shows the confidence that he showed in his teammate. Bell wasn’t very happy with his P18 finish, but as a true team player, he avoided a costly wreck for the veteran.
Speaking on his Actions Detrimental podcast, Hamlin said, “Now we made contact with all of them. I think I saw smoke off me and the 20 [Christopher Bell] when we took off. Like just taking off we were side by side, smoke rolling off the tires because we were making contact. A lot of it was because me, I was running down the track because there was a big water spot off of Turn 4. So while I’m accelerating, I don’t want to run through that water, get wheels spin, next thing you know he gets the momentum. So I’m trying to squeeze him down the track a little bit to avoid the water. So we’re making contact all the way around.”
Hamlin also noted how by the time they got to Turn 4, he could see Bell drifting up the track, and could feel it too. He said he could sense the air shifting in the car and the pressure changing, and that is when he could sense that Bell was getting closer to him. In that moment, the only thing Hamlin was thinking about was “Please, just don’t run into me. Don’t clean us out here.” And he truly believes that is what made Bell spin, and that he was doing everything he could to avoid hitting both the JGR cars, insinuating that Bell was doing the right thing.
No one wants to take out their own teammate, and the race at Dover between Bell, Hamlin, and Briscoe was pure hard racing. Let’s hope to see more of this in the playoffs this year!
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