Chase Elliott and Denny Hamlin's feud on the track last weekend during the 600-mile-long race on Memorial Day Weekend, the Coca-Cola 600, has sent stock car racing fans into a frenzy. The #11 Toyota and #9 Chevrolet drivers were unhappy with their performance during one of NASCAR's crown jewel events, with both sitting out of the race after lap 186.
Not even halfway into the 400-lap-long event, Hamlin and Elliott were seen fighting each other for position when the former tried to crowd the latter up the racetrack. As a result, Chase Elliott hit the outside wall and reacted by hitting Denny Hamlin's right rear fender, sending him into a spin and a violent crash.
Roush Fenway Keselowski Racing's Brad Keselowski had the best view of the incident as he was following both drivers closely. He elaborated on the incident, unable to clarify if the contact was intentional or not, and said:
"I couldn't tell. I saw the eleven (Denny Hamlin) come up, I saw him hit the nine (Chase Elliott) and then everybody checked up and they were right in my face immediately and it felt like I might have made contact with one of them, I don't know."
With Brad Keselowski's inconclusive statements about the contact between Hamlin and Elliott during the Coca-Cola 600, fans will have to rely on other sources to ascertain whether the right-rear hook by Elliott was an intentional move on Denny Hamlin or not.
Fans react to Chase Elliott's contact with Denny Hamlin at Charlotte Motor Speedway
With an old storyline re-emerging after quite a while, Hamlin and Elliott fans were seen going at it on social media defending their favorite driver.
Some of the best reactions online are as follows:
"Here for the Chase fans claiming he didn’t hook Denny"
"That needs to be a one race suspension."
"Josh Berry on his way to sub for a Hendrick driver again:"
"Last year: Arrest Wallace, Drop Sponsors, Suspend him permanently, fire him. This year: It was a racing deal, Broken suspension, Brad bumped him. SMT data doesn’t lie folks. If you want NASCAR to be consistent, a 1 race suspension is warranted."
NASCAR goes live from the World Wide Technology Raceway for the Enjoy Illinois 300 next weekend.