NASCAR Cup stars react to Days of Thunder sequel and meeting Tom Cruise at Daytona

All 16 NASCAR Cup drivers who qualified for the Chase took part in Media Day on Wednesday, and several fielded questions about the long-awaited Days of Thunder sequel that is coming to theaters in June of 2028. Tom Cruise will again star as fictional NASCAR driver Cole Trickle, with Anne Hathaway co-starring as a team owner/engineer.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. has been in contact with the minds developing a script for the film for over a year, and is among those very excited to see the movie come together.

But what do the current stars of the sport think? Here’s a sampling from Media Day:

Carson Hocevar — “Super cool to put my input into the movie”

(Talladega winner, No. 12 Chase seed)

“That was actually the first time I met him (Tom Cruise). We were trying to line up with his team on when to meet him, and his security guard came and grabbed me and stood me right in front of him. I was talking to the sailors earlier, and they were fans of me. He was going down the line of sailors and kind of glanced over to see if there was another one. He looked back and realized it was me. They were telling me, “When he sees you, he’s going to recognize you. He loves you.” That’s super cool, that’s fun. It’s been super cool to put my input into the movie; give ideas and video clips from real-life moments from the last 20 years.”

Kyle Larson — Appearing in the movie “would be a cool opportunity”

(2x NASCAR Cup champion, No. 7 Chase seed)

“Oh, I don’t know. I mean, it’s whatever they want. I think it would be a cool opportunity, for sure, but I’m also not an actor, so I don’t want to make the film worse. It was awesome to get the opportunity to meet him (Tom Cruise). He’s a celebrity like I’ve never met before in my life. You could tell he was different than the rest of us, in a cool way, like really, really cool. We got to meet him in a prior meeting before the driver’s meeting, and it was just cool to hear him talk about us. He kind of already knows a little bit about us, so I thought that was neat. I look forward to kind of seeing the process of them making a movie and having, hopefully, us involved in some form or fashion of helping to build a storyline, be a part of the movie or whatever.

“I would love them (Hendrick Motorsports) to be involved, and I don’t think there’s another team in the sport that would do as much or as good of a job of helping build the best film possible than Hendrick Motorsports. They just go above and beyond on everything, and they have the experience of helping out with the last one. I haven’t heard if they’re a part of it or not. I hope they are. I think that’d be just really cool and awesome to see that kind of happening within the walls of Hendrick Motorsports. I hope they can do something to work it out to be a part of it because I think it would make the movie even better.”

Denny Hamlin — “Excited to see how it all turns out”

(Winningest active driver in NASCAR Cup with 64 wins, No. 1 Chase seed)

“Well, like everyone else probably in this industry, if you hit the TV Guide and it’s on, you usually click on it. I thought it was the first kind of racing movie I got introduced to that actually depicted the lifestyle of racing. And it felt real to me back then. A lot of it was dramatized, of course, but it still was NASCAR. I’m really looking forward to kind of seeing how they depict that and the conversations and the things that Tom (Cruise) and Jerry Bruckheimer (producer) have said, you know, that they want to tell the story of NASCAR here in the second one. So I’m excited to see how it all turns out.”

Chase Briscoe — Tom Cruise “just felt like one of the guys”

(2x Southern 500 winner, No. 5 Chase seed)

“It was really neat (to meet Cruise). It actually started earlier in that day. We were doing our driver council meeting and that kind of door opened off to the side and there was like two Suburbans there. All of a sudden, Tom Cruise walked in and none of us knew that was happening, and he’s just sitting there and talked with us for like 20, 25 minutes about his goal of what to do with the movie and how he wants to paint us out to be. And it was really interesting just hearing the parallels between Top Gun and how he feels like Days of Thunder could be. So yeah, it was cool. He was super nice. I thought it was really cool how he went to every single owner basically in the garage and spent time with them and he just felt like one of the guys truthfully. You never know how those, you know, I guess superstars are going to be, and Tom, he could be hanging out in here and just be chilling with us. He was super nice.”

Joey Logano — “I would love to” be a part of Days of Thunder 2

(3x NASCAR Cup champion, No. 9 Chase seed)

“I would love to. I mean, it’s a cool movie. Are you kidding me? It would be some wicked cool dad points to be in Days of Thunder, yeah. Hopefully, that happens.”