What was the deal with Denny Hamlin and Chase Briscoe's Iowa brakes?

Motorsport photo

Within moments of hitting the track on Saturday at Iowa Speedway, Denny Hamlin realized he had a problem, and it was one that crew chief Chris Gayle recognized as one that would potentially end their race before it began.

He didn’t have adequate brake pressure.

Their Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Chase Briscoe began suffering from the same problem and crew chief James Small reached the same conclusion. Ditto their alliance stablemate at 23XI, Riley Herbst and crew chief Davin Restivo.

Those three cars alongside the 23XI no. 23 of Bubba Wallace spent deep into the morning garage hours making various adjustments in the hopes of giving their drivers a shot to compete on Sunday.

These teams were allowed to drain their brake lines, referred to as ‘bleeding,’ without penalty and can change their rotors if they are cracked. This is a safety matter and both the No. 11 and 35 teams made that change as well.

Additionally, Gayle’s No. 11 team also change their brake coolant ducts, which resulted in a to the rear penalty, and that was a moot point since Hamlin only qualified 32nd anyway. Small was not able to change his rotors despite saying that morning that they were ‘destroyed’ and did not feel confident in making a competitive effort.

For his part, Gayle said it was 50/50 whether or not these changes would be enough to get Hamlin to end of the race and with a chance to compete. As for the 23XI Racing camp, their internal expectations were that Tyler Reddick did not expect any issues and Bubba Wallace would largely be okay as well.

Herbst was expected to have a rough go of it.

Meanwhile, the other Tier 1 Toyota team of Legacy Motor Club did not have any issues, for reasons explained by No. 43 car chief Austin Pollak before the race.

"JGR and 23XI run a different package than we do."

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Hamlin later said his brake pedal went straight to the floor by Lap 3, and Briscoe experienced the same issue shortly afterwards. It was the worst-case scenario for both Gayle and Small. Even so, their drivers finished fifth and sixth, despite the physical toll it took on them.

Hamlin will take that given how dire it sounded all weekend, right?

“No question,” Hamlin said. “If I would have known it was going to be like this the whole race, I would have said (give me a) top 25. I honestly would have been happy with it. But they kept working on the car and adjusting around not having any brakes.

“They had to adjust the car for it and did the best they could. And they just did a great job of giving me something that I could somewhat get around the corners for 350 laps.”

A very worn out Denny Hamlin who could not be more pleased with getting a top 5 out of a race at Iowa without brakes pic.twitter.com/NjcvXhTAth

— Matt Weaver (@MattWeaverRA) August 9, 2026 His exhaustion made him look frail and he knew even before the race it was likely going to go something like this.

“This was the worst mindset I've had going into a race that I can remember,” Hamlin said. “I never felt beat before I start ever and I just knew I was done today. I knew there was a chance it could be fixed but I knew it was still the same components that couldn’t be fixed so I felt down about today and switched my goals to needing some cars to wreck and maybe finish inside the top 25.

“That honestly was the goal but the team just kept working on the car to adapt it to not having the stopping power. That allowed me to manipulate the car a little bit differently.”

Briscoe said he had never had this much anxiety going into a race before Sunday.

“Honestly, the first stage I had zero issues and I was amazed that I didn't because I was expecting to,” Briscoe said. “And then, in the middle of the second stage, I went into the corner and all of a sudden (my brake pedal) went to the floor just like yesterday.

“And it was weird. I would have a restart and it would be good for five or six laps, then right back to the floor. And I mean, I was just pumping nonstop all the way around the racetrack. And sometimes you'd have a pedal the next time you would pump and it would go to the floor.”

Chase Briscoe is very pleased with a sixth given that James Small told him he was driving without brakes from the start. pic.twitter.com/3RbitdgGHN

— Matt Weaver (@MattWeaverRA) August 9, 2026

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What happened?

NASCAR rules do not allow brake pad changes on a race weekend until the start of the race, and that would require losing several laps.

And while neither Gayle nor Small would get into exactly what pads they were using, it’s commonplace for teams to engage in brake splitting -- running several different combinations together.

Teams are allowed to use whichever pads they want.

“I would say it was just a brake choice that we made that we could not undo this weekend,” Gayle told Motorsport.com after the race. “And it kind of surprised a few of the teams. A few of the Toyota teams that were running it have run it safely to other places with no problems and it just kind of caught us all off guard here.”

Small echoed those sentiments.

“We came here, like I told you this morning, trying to do the right things, be conservative, cure (brake) shake and it kind of bit us,” Small said. “It's not like it was a new package for us. We've run it successfully at a bunch of other short tracks in Nashville. And yeah, I was just thankful to hang on and we took a sixth and moved up into fifth in the standings so it was an overall decent day.”

It may have even been a preview of sorts for the second race of the Chase for the Championship at Gateway. Or if nothing else, these were lessons learned for what not to do in that race, which is why they tried it here.

Tyler Allen, crew chief for race winning dri...

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