For Denny Hamlin, Time To Move On From Chase Disappointment

Forced to dwell on his championship loss for a few more days in Las Vegas, Denny Hamlin says it’s time for him to start moving on.

As NASCAR celebrated Jimmie Johnson’s fifth consecutive Sprint Cup title at its annual champions week, Hamlin had to go through all the activities (along with the other 11 Chase drivers) and relive his defeat.

The points leader heading into the final race, his Joe Gibbs Racing team’s poor fuel mileage (or strategy) cost Hamlin as many as 60 points at Phoenix, which left him with just a 15-point lead heading into Homestead.

He then qualified 38th, spun out early while racing three-wide and wasn’t able to dethrone Johnson.

“I’m OK now,” he told reporters Friday night after his banquet speech. “I’m glad to get it over with and whatnot. Today is the last day in which I have to think about 2010. I can just move onto ‘11 on Monday.

“It stings and it will sting (in the future), I’m sure. But we only had to put up with it for two weeks.”

On Monday, Hamlin will meet with crew chief Mike Ford to begin discussing plans for 2011. It’s interesting to note that the two haven’t spoken since Homestead.

“We haven’t really talked at all since,” Hamlin said. “Because what do I say to him? What does he say to me? We need time to work things out and obviously, we have a lot of the same personality. So for me, I like that he’s given me that space and I’m given him that space.”

Hamlin said he wasn’t beating himself up too much for the defeat, because “I felt I did the best I could.”

His team “executed perfectly” until the end of the Phoenix race and Homestead, he said. He took solace in knowing “if our fuel mileage is better, we win a championship.”

“I don’t feel like we got outdrove, I don’t feel like Jimmie was just a better driver and that’s how he won a championship, it’s just the strategy and whatnot that kept us from winning this year,” Hamlin said.

Hamlin compared his loss to having a chance to hit a game-winning home run that went foul.

“We did a really great job of stepping up to the plate, it’s just that unfortunately, our ball hooked foul instead of going fair at the end,” he said.

Would Hamlin have done anything differently? Looking back now, he blamed himself for not being aggressive enough in getting bonus points for leading laps at first half of the Chase.

He also said he wouldn’t have put himself in the three-wide situation that resulted in a spin through the grass at Homestead – but wasn’t aware it was three-wide (he said replays of radio chatter suggested he believed he was two-wide, but Paul Menard forced Greg Biffle and Hamlin three-wide).

“Really, there’s not much I could have done differently,” he said.

Hamlin said he’s fortunate he came into the sport during a time when young drivers were still able to get rides on their own merit instead of money, but unlucky that his entrance into NASCAR coincided with the start of Johnson’s reign.

“Unlucky me,” he said. ”...I came in here and I’m racing a guy that’s equal to Richard Petty.

“The competition level is just unreal. ... That’s what makes what they did so unbelievable, is that they’re doing it against the toughest competition ever.”

If Hamlin has his way, he’ll make Johnson’s competition even more difficult in 2011.

“We were never this competitive with the Hendrick bunch like we were this year,” Hamlin said. “And next year I hope to be twice as much.”