"I don't mind being a lizard": Denny Hamlin open to 'adapting to the environment' and performing divebombs at the ROVAL playoff race

Ahead of this Sunday's race at the ROVAL, Denny Hamlin was asked for his take on drivers divebombing to gain position on the track. On road course races, while entering a turn, drivers try to pass the car in front by braking very late in hopes of catching their opponents off guard with the move.

During a press interaction on Saturday, a journalist asked Denny Hamlin about the 'art of divebomb', and whether it is a tool in his bag of tricks. In response, the JGR veteran claimed he would be willing to adapt to the circumstances.

"Not really but certainly if I get desperate enough I don't mind being a lizard in adapting to my environment. It's just you wait and see how people around you race and certainly we see when things like that happen and we see those being really aggressive, it almost gives you a free ticket to be like, 'Well, that's how we're going to do it today and so I'm not going to really care about the result of this divebomb against you.' It's certainly, ethics is way different than what it used to be in the past," Hamlin described. [9:06]

He further added that at this stage of the season, every driver has something at stake and it'll be interesting to see how the race pans out. Following his response, Denny Hamlin was asked if he had ever attempted a noteworthy divebomb on another driver, to which he said:

"I'm sure I have at some point. I always end up with the s**t end of the stick surely because I wreck myself most times," he replied.

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Denny Hamlin wasn't a fan of the racing 'ethics' at the end of Chicago Street Course race earlier this year

With the end of the Chicago Street Course race in July this year producing a series of chaotic incidents, Denny Hamlin addressed the 'ethical' situation in modern NASCAR on an episode of his podcast Actions Detrimental and said (as quoted by ON3):

"What’s kind of crappy to see, is that it seems like ethics go out the window, a little bit," Hamlin said.

He mentioned that for every spot gained at every corner, a driver was being shipped into the corner and sent into the barrier and claimed that this was a consequence of the race being in its closing stages. He questioned if such maneuvers were 'worth' it at the cost of upsetting other drivers.

The #11 driver clarified his stance by highlighting that there was a difference between making a mistake as he and Austin Cindric did, which took out both of them at the end, versus deliberately knocking each other into the tire barriers which in his opinion, affected the image of NASCAR.

Along with the changing ethical landscape in NASCAR, it's worth mentioning that ahead of Talladega recently, Denny Hamlin remarked on the changing landscape of superspeedway racing.

"All those things that I learned from Dale (Earnhardt ) Jr. and Tony Stewart back in the day... gone! All those techniques I learned; how to pass, how to create runs, and all that stuff... got to stay in line," Hamlin claimed (at 0:46).