Q. You were so confident in this car. You got the pole earlier, but then you slipped back a little bit. How did you fight your way back and take the lead with 10 laps to go and then hold off your teammate and pass him?
DENNY HAMLIN: A lot of it was just what happened in front of me with the 54 and 22, and you just never know what was going to happen there, but I got a really good run off of Turn 2 and just got position and was able to hang on from there.
It’s so chaotic, the restarts, with everyone just bumping and banging, but feels great to win here in LA.
Q. I know you had shoulder surgery in the off-season, so there’s question marks coming in. Then you get the big win to kick the season off. What does this mean to you and the team and starting the year this way?
DENNY HAMLIN: It’s a great momentum boost. It doesn’t do much more than that. But I clean off all the trophies every January 1st in the entryway of the house, and now we get to add one pretty quick, so really happy about that.
FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports
