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Denny Hamlin will return to racing with a new crew chief starting in 2025. While a major change may be upon the No. 11 team, the upcoming crew chief, Chris Gayle, feels optimistic about racing with Hamlin, who has yet to win a championship.
Hamlin is a veteran NASCAR driver who won 54 races in the Cup Series. He will team up with Chris Gayle for the next season, with outgoing crew chief Chris Gabehart taking the role of Competition Director for Joe Gibbs Racing.
In an interview with SiriusXM NASCAR Radio on X (formerly Twitter), Gayle shared his thoughts on becoming the No. 11 crew chief.
"It absolutely is a great honor and a great opportunity for me," Gayle said.
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Understanding that Denny Hamlin is a veteran who wants to win instead of rebuilding, Chris Gayle believes he is the right fit considering he's been around the team since 2003.
"I think that if you look at Denny's perspective, he has been around a lot, he had that team and got a lot of years under his belt, he's ready to compete. He has fewer years in front of him than what he has behind him, so he doesn't want to have to have a complete rebuild. So moving me over to the 11 team and kind of filling that role that Gabehart had and keeping the rest of the team intact allows that to happen.
The new shot caller concluded by saying:
"So hopefully, that will make it much more seamless than if we started from outside or someone who didn't have any experience with that."
Chris Gayle will come off from a two-year run as a crew chief for Ty Gibbs in the No. 54 team. He also had previous experiences as a crew chief in the Xfinity Series, with the 2021 season witnessing him win 10 races with four drivers, namely Ty Gibbs, Christopher Bell, Kyle Busch, and John Hunter Nemechek.
Gayle will succeed the Hamlin-Gabehart duo, which had 22 Cup race wins in six seasons including two Daytona 500 victories.
Denny Hamlin 'shocked' by new crew chief announcement
Before the 2024 NASCAR Awards Banquet, Denny Hamlin made his feelings known about the crew chief change for next season. Hamlin admitted feeling 'shocked' about Chris Gabehart leaving the role as Chris Gayle is set to take over.
Speaking with Bob Pockrass, the No. 11 Toyota pilot said:
"I mean, I, I certainly was shocked by it. That's all,"
Denny Hamlin believes part of the change was to help improve the performance of Ty Gibbs and the No. 54 team.
"There's they've gotta, they gotta do what's best for the company. And I think that they're looking for an improvement on performance on the 54 and they're looking for an overall performance for all the teams. Because, you know, we certainly hadn't won the amount of races as an organization is what we should have," Hamlin added.
As of this writing, Joe Gibbs Racing has yet to announce Ty Gibbs' new crew chief.
Denny Hamlin and Chris Gayle will return to action as teammates at the season-opener Daytona 500 in February 2025.
