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Denny Hamlin says he will appeal $25,000 fine

Denny Hamlin took to Twitter Thursday night and said he will appeal the $25,000 fine that NASCAR levied against him for comments he made after Phoenix.

At Las Vegas for testing, an angry Hamlin said that he wasn't going to pay the fine, and elaborated further on Twitter.

The short of the long of it is I believe I was severely disrespected by NASCAR by getting fined. I believe that the simple fact of us not even having a conversation about this issue before I was hit with a fine has something to say about our relationship. What I said was 1 sentence taken completely out of context. Most drivers will tell you that we constantly have our AND nascars best interest in mind when speaking. On the other hand I am a person that worked very hard from the BOTTOM to get where I am today and someone telling me that I can give my 100 percent honest opinion really bothers me. Since being fined in 2010 I have been a lot more careful about what I say to media and I felt this past weekend felt completely in my rights to give a assessment of the question asked. I feel as if today NASCAR lost one of its biggest supporters vocally of where our sport is headed. So in the end there are no winners. I said today I would not pay the fine. I stand by that and will go through the process of appealing. Trust me, this is not about the money.. It's much deeper. I will now shift my focus on giving FedEx and my team what they deserve this weekend, a win.

NASCAR Vice President of Competition Robin Pemberton said that the appeal process for Hamlin's fine would be the same as the one that teams go through for technical violations. However, let's be honest; this isn't nearly as objective as a technical violation would be, and that subjectivity could impact Hamlin's chances of winning his appeal for a fine he should have never received in the first place.