"I know he will learn a lot" - Kyle Larson addresses Denny Hamlin's offensive tweet, claims 'NASCAR did what they had to do'

Reigning champion Kyle Larson and his friend Denny Hamlin were in the spotlight last week, but on different grounds.

Following the conclusion of the Talladega race, in which Hamlin suffered a double loss after failing in his last lap fuel calculation, both of his top ten drivers wrecked on the final lap.

Following the disappointment, Denny Hamlin tried to make a meme out of Larson's latest move to Talladega and went on to post it on his Twitter account. However, the meme didn’t sit well with most social media users or NASCAR since it turned out to be racially insensitive.

Denny shared a clip where he tried to compare Larson's last-lap move to an Asian woman from "Family Guy." After the blowback, the No. 11 pulled down the post and apologized for it, but NASCAR had already seen it and projected him into six weeks of mandatory sensitivity training.

Kyle Larson did not comment on the issue until last weekend after the Dover race, when he was asked if he felt offended by the tweet. But the two were close friends, and Larson said he never personally felt offended.

Speaking about the tweet and NASCAR’s action against Hamlin with Fox’s Bob Pockrass, Kyle stated that:

"NASCAR did what they had to do, and I appreciate Denny going through the steps to learn from that. Obviously, it was just poor judgment on his part. I think being in the position that we’re in, you have to be very careful with what you put out to the public. I know he’ll learn a lot from the next couple of weeks. I think we’re all just ready to move past it and get back focused on racing."

He added:

"I wasn’t personally offended by it because he is my friend, but I know, and I think he knows now how there’s millions of other people that a tweet like that could offend. No hard feelings from me"

Kyle Larson was placed in sixth position at Dover Motor Speedway

Larson is known for being more aggressive in the final laps, and this was the case in Talladega, where he made a move that changed the course of the race, resulting in a wild finish. Last weekend, he was still shining at the Monster Mile.

The race, which was scheduled for Sunday, was stretched to Monday after inclement weather interfered with the event after 78 laps of stage one. By the time the race was being postponed, the reigning champion was the one holding the lead.

On Monday, he began as the leader but failed to hold on to it as his teammate Chase Elliott found his way into the last lap and drove his No. 9 Chevrolet to the victory lane. Kyle Larson ended up posting a sixth-place finish despite being the favorite to win.