"The car is not set up well": Denny Hamlin sums up after qualifying in P15 for the upcoming NASCAR Cup race at Las Vegas

Slated to start the first race of the NASCAR Round of 8 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, Joe Gibbs Racing's Denny Hamlin was one driver not particularly happy with his qualifying performance. The #11 Toyota Camry TRD driver will start in P15 come the 400-mile-long event in Sin City, trying to make his bid into the Championship 4 worthwhile in Sin City.

The South Point 400 will see Hamlin's fellow teammate Christopher Bell start in pole position after relegating Hendrick Motorsports' Kyle Larson to P2 on the grid. Another Joe Gibbs Racing driver, Martin Truex Jr. also slipped in a decent qualifying bid with a starting position of P4 on Sunday.

Denny Hamlin elaborated on why he and his team seemed to be off the pace at the 1.5-mile-long track in Vegas, a type of track configuration they have typically excelled at.

The 42-year-old said in a post-qualifying interview with frontstretch.com:

"This has not been a track where we have practiced or qualified well at. The conditions are dramatically different from what we're going to race in tomorrow. I feel more confident in the process that we've got to get ready for the race versus going out here and being super fast. We tried the best we could but certainly, the car is not set up well for these conditions."

On whether he expects tire wear to be an issue during the race, Hamlin said:

"There's always going to be tire issues here and there especially on a track that fast, early in the morning you're going to have issues like that for sure."

It remains to be seen how Denny Hamlin goes about his first appearance in the Round of 8 this season.

---

Denny Hamlin chimes in on Toyota's advantage going into the first NASCAR Round of 8 race

Toyota as a manufacturer has always been outnumbered by Ford and Chevrolet in NASCAR, with the majority of the cars and teams running either the blue oval or the bowtie in the sport.

However, going into the 2023 Round of 8 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, four out of eight contenders in the final round before the championship race find themselves in Toyota cars.

Denny Hamlin, a Toyota driver himself, chimed in on what that means for the manufacturer. He said (via frontstretch.com):

"When you get down to the final eight and you got half the field, it’s pretty good, right? So certainly, I think that the way they do things has been really successful."

The South Point 400 goes live on Sunday, October 15, 2023, at 2:30 pm ET.