Kyle Larson claims his second-career NASCAR Cup Series Championship, after Chris Gayle made a controversial call on pit road for Denny Hamlin
AVONDALE, ARIZ. — Denny Hamlin had the 2025 NASCAR Cup Series Championship in his grasp. He led a staggering 208 of the scheduled 312 laps at Phoenix Raceway, showcasing the kind of dominance that had defined his playoff run.
With just four laps remaining in regulation, victory—and his elusive first title—seemed inevitable. Then the yellow flag flew, erasing Hamlin’s hard-earned lead and forcing the race into overtime.
On the ensuing pit stops, the championship hung in the balance of a single strategic call. Hamlin’s crew chief, Chris Gayle, opted to bolt on four fresh Goodyear tires, prioritizing long-run speed and tire management for what could become a multi-lap shootout. Meanwhile, Kyle Larson, took only right-side rubber under crew chief Cliff Daniels.
The decision handed Larson the coveted track position. When the green flag dropped for overtime, Larson held serve. He powered away over the final two laps to finish third on the track—enough to clinch the championship by a mere three points in the final standings.
Hamlin, restarting from tenth after the four-tire stop, fought valiantly but could only muster a sixth-place finish, falling agonizingly short.
Was the rightful champion crowned? No. Larson entered the finale with just three victories all season—his most recent coming way back in May at Kansas Speedway. Hamlin, by contrast, had racked up six wins, the most by any driver this year.
Yet championships are not awarded for season-long body of work under the current playoff format; they are decided in a single winner-take-all race. That system produced high-stakes drama, but it also exposed its fragility when one pit-road gamble overshadows 35 prior events.
Two truths can coexist here. First, deciding a season-long title on a two-lap sprint after a late caution is inherently flawed—it compresses 10 months of grinding consistency into a coin flip. Second, no one bears more responsibility for the outcome than Gayle and the No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing pit crew.
Track position has been king on short tracks and road courses all year; taking four tires surrendered the one advantage Hamlin had built over 300-plus miles. Larson’s two-tire call was aggressive but calculated.
NASCAR executives surely popped champagne in the control room. From a business standpoint, mission accomplished. But fairness? That’s another matter. Hamlin’s team controlled its own destiny until the moment it didn’t.
The caution itself raised eyebrows: it was caused by Larson’s Hendrick Motorsports teammate William Byron, who blew a tire. Conspiracy theorists will immediately cry fix, even if the idea is a bit absurd. Still, the optics were brutal: a teammate’s issue directly benefited the new champion.
The analogy to stick-and-ball blunders writes itself. This was Pete Carroll dialing up a slant pass from the one-yard line in Super Bowl XLIX instead of handing off to Marshawn Lynch. It was Gregg Williams calling an all-out blitz on third-and-long in the 2001 NFC Championship, leaving Randy Moss uncovered for a 40-yard dagger. In each case, a single decision—executed in a pressure cooker—nullified months of preparation.
Hamlin, now 44, carries the weight of history. His 60 career Cup victories are the most ever for a driver without a championship. Hamlin has reached the Championship 4 five times since the format’s inception, yet each November brings the same heartbreak. In 2025, he lost a race he was four laps from winning.
Crew chiefs are hired to be aggressive, not conservative. Gayle stepped into the No. 11 role last offseason after Chris Gabehart's promotion to competition director—a move that had Hamlin admitting he was initially "worried" about the transition at his age. Yet Gayle gelled quickly, delivering six wins and positioning the team for the title fight.
Ultimately, this is a team sport masquerading as an individual duel. Drivers get the glory, but crew chiefs, spotters, engineers, and 40 over-the-wall athletes share the blame.
NASCAR will tinker with the format again—maybe expand the Championship field, maybe weight regular-season performance more heavily—but the core tension remains. Excitement versus equity. Drama versus dominance.
Until the sanctioning body reconciles those opposites, stories like Hamlin’s will persist: a driver who did everything right for 8,000 miles, only to see it undone in eight seconds on pit road.
Denny Hamlin is not the 2025 champion because his team blinked when the lights were brightest. That stings, but it’s also the cruel beauty of playoff racing. Some days the call is genius. Other days it’s the difference between immortality and infamy.
For Hamlin, the search for that first Bill France Cup continues—one more year older, one more scar deeper.