“Drove like a**holes”: 23XI Racing boss Denny Hamlin calls out ‘immature’ Xfinity stars for Martinsville last-lap mayhem 

NASCAR Cup Series driver and 23XI team owner, Denny Hamlin spoke out about the performances of certain drivers who competed in this past weekend's Xfinity Series event, the 'US Marine Corps 250' on Saturday, March 29. The race took place at the Martinsville Speedway and featured 14 caution periods in the span of 104 laps, ultimately ending with an altercation between drivers Sammy Smith and Taylor Gray.

According to Hamlin, the latter driver should've won the race, and as a team owner, he felt that other drivers raced inappropriately. Discussing the Martinsville Speedway race on the latest episode of his Actions Detrimental podcast, the 23XI Racing co-owner spoke about how he was not impressed by the performance of race winner Austin Hill, as well as fifth-place finisher Sam Mayer, and Smith, who ended up finishing his race in tenth place.

"I can speak to what I am as a car owner - I'm not impressed. Austin Hill, Sam Mayer, Sammy Smith drove like a**holes."

Hamlin also spoke about what steps can be taken to change the behavior of drivers on track, as well as discussing his reaction as a team owner if this kind of driving was done by his drivers

"There's only a few things you can do to really change this. I think public shaming is maybe some of it. I own some cars in the Cup Series and if you ever think I'm going to look at you just because you wiped a guy out and won? No, that doesn't impress me. It just shows me immaturity."

Hamlin also spoke about who he felt should've been the race winner, while calling upon NASCAR to institute penalities against the driving seen at Martinsville.

"Taylor Gray really deserved to win the race, he didn't. You know, I hear some people talking about "What do you do about it?" If you can't let us police it on the racetrack, NASCAR needs to step in. If you penalize once, it at least gives these guys a little bit of a pause and more than likely, you face the repercussions then."

The next race in the Xfinity Series calendar takes place at the Darlington Speedway on Saturday, April 5th at 3:30 p.m. ET.

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Denny Hamlin shares '11 against the World' phrase after race win

The Joe Gibbs Racing driver added one more win to his record this past weekend when Denny Hamlin's #11 car crossed the finish line at the Cook Out 400 Cup Series event at the Martinsville Speedway to take first place. After winning the event, he climbed on top of his car, waving a flag that showed off a phrase that read:

"11 against the world"

The aforementioned phrase references Ohio State Football's 'Ohio against the World' slogan. Hamlin shared a video of his race-winning celebration to his Instagram, adding a scoreboard between him and the world.

After leading 274 laps, Denny Hamlin scored his first victory at his home state (Martinsville), breaking a ten-year-long winless streak.