“There hasn’t been a lot of dominating,” Denny Hamlin said about his team last month, even after a spectacular streak. But what does he mean? JGR has been on a roll, right? Christopher Bell put up a jaw-dropping three-peat victorious streak early in the 2025 season, while Hamlin also went back-to-back to win at Martinsville and Darlington. Yet, a concerning factor has again arisen regarding JGR cars – or specifically, the disparity in them, and it’s one he saw at the All-Star weekend as well.

Joe Gibbs Racing has had a long history of engine failures and technical mishaps. In 2024, Denny Hamlin incurred a penalty for using a rule-violating engine for his iconic Bristol race win. No such engine mishaps have emerged in 2024. However, the All-Star Race revealed a glaring difference in pace.

Well, another veteran Cup Series driver noticed troubles in the JGR camp this year. 2014 Cup Series champion Kevin Harvick observed a lack of competitive pace due to car issues in Las Vegas. “All the Gibbs cars were not as fast as they needed to be,” Harvick said. Chase Briscoe’s No. 19 car had a wheel fly off and narrowly missed a hefty penalty. Then Denny Hamlin’s No. 11 car landed a speeding penalty. According to Harvick, only Christopher Bell avoided major issues, except for his pit road scramble to get his tires fixed at a different stall. Similar issues persisted into the All-Star Race. While Bell hounded race leader Joey Logano for most of the race, Hamlin lagged behind outside the top 10.

This difference in speed entailed a number of reasons. According to Denny Hamlin, it was already decided before the race started – Hamlin finished last in the All-Star Heat race, which relegated him to the 20th starting position. So the JGR veteran said in a recent ‘Actions Detrimental’ episode: “Because he qualified well, he always was up towards the front. And there’s a massive, massive difference between running in the top-four to five the entire time in somewhat clean air vs being 20th where I was. Again, I expect enough out of my car to be able to pass…I couldn’t pass anyone, was mostly in the way of 18th. But I always believe, your speed should outrun your position.”

Now, Hamlin talking about clean air shouldn’t be a surprise. That’s been the story of the Next-Gen era. It’s not just that these cars are built for parity and churn out similar performance, but that when following a car on the track, the aerodynamics of the Next-Gen car translate it to losing grip in traffic. And that’s what happened to Hamlin. He could only manage to climb up to 12th place after starting in 20th. However, if we look at data across the season, it tells a bit of a different story. Hamlin has consistently been a better qualifier, with an average starting place of 12.6 against Bell’s 13.8. Could that mean Bell finds it easier to overtake in the pack? The three consecutive wins at Atlanta, COTA, and Phoenix make it seem so. Bell started in 32nd, 19th, and 11th places respectively and still won.

Denny Hamlin further shed light on the difference between his and Christopher Bell’s positions. He said, “The fastest car on the racetrack should be the leader, because they have the most grip pushing down on their car and making grip…By the time you get to 20th, the air is so disturbed, you essentially have no grip pushing down on your car, and you’re relying totally on mechanical grip at that time.” There were other issues that plagued North Wilkesboro Speedway: “The cars are too equal. Fox was actually putting lap times up on their ticker, everyone’s running 10th and a half…Your lap times just don’t vary that much at that track. I think they hardened up the left side tire from what we had last year. It had no wear on it. I think the total falloff over a total 60-80 laps was like 2-and-a-half tenths.”

Clearly, Denny Hamlin did not have a satisfying weekend. Interestingly, even race winner Christopher Bell pointed out concerns similar to Hamlin’s.

When track position becomes paramount

We all know that when Christopher Bell is focused, he can be aggressive. That is how he clinched three back-to-back victories this year. However, the struggles have been plenty for the No. 20 car as well. But those weren’t going to stop him last weekend.

During the All-Star Race, Bell started 2nd, but he had to fend off several rivals. Joey Logano’s 139-lap dominance was an enormous barrier that Bell worked hard to break. When Michael Waltrip waved the promoter’s caution flag on lap 215, Bell got his big break. The No. 20 car changed into two fresh tires while Logano stayed out. That defined the rest of the race, as Bell toppled Logano’s lead for good with 10 laps to go.

Yet after clinching his victory, Christopher Bell attributed his success to track position. Echoing Denny Hamlin’s concerns about the risk of having slower cars, Bell said: “If I have pace in my car, I have done well at finishing races off. It’s whenever I’m the one that’s falling back or I have the slower car, I would get myself in trouble, I would spin out, I would hit the wall, I would wreck trying to overextend myself whenever it wasn’t my day.” Adam Stevens, the No. 20 crew chief, also reflected on how the latter half of 2024 was a bad trip: “Last year we just weren’t able to capitalize the second half, maybe last two-thirds of the season. There were a tremendous number of races where we had race-winning speed, and for whatever reason, a lot of them didn’t work out.”

Evidently, Joe Gibbs Racing may need to work together to fix these issues of pace. With the 2025 season rolling ahead, let us see what developments arise in this regard.