Hamlin confident despite poor qualifying effort

FONTANA, Calif. -- With another dominating performance at Auto Club Speedway, Jimmie Johnson could make major gains on the rest of the Chase field on Sunday. After all, he's won four of the past six races here and hasn't finished outside of the top 10 since 2006.

On the other hand, Denny Hamlin's most recent finishes at Fontana were 37th and 29th. And in nine previous starts on the 2-mile oval, he's recorded only three top-10s. But despite what appears to be overwhelming statistical evidence to the contrary, Hamlin seems anything but intimidated.

"We feel like we can come to California and win," Hamlin said. "We've been in contention to win a couple of these races here. I come here to finish No. 1, nowhere else."

In order to do that, Hamlin will have to make up for a less-than-stellar qualifying performance, which left him 34th on the grid. The farthest back a winner has started was Matt Kenseth, who started 31st in 2006. But the eventual victor has started outside of the top 15 on nine occasions, so Hamlin may have reasons for his confident approach.

"I think we're going to go out there and attempt to beat [Johnson] straight up and gain points this weekend," Hamlin said. "I don't think this is a race track where I feel like, 'I don't want to lose a certain amount of points.' I want to go out there and close back in on the lead."

The No. 11 Toyota team appeared to make major strides in Saturday's two practice sessions. He was sixth in the morning practice and backed it up by running ninth-quickest in hotter conditions later in Happy Hour.

However, Johnson's No. 48 Chevrolet paced the final practice for Sunday's Pepsi Max 400 with a fast lap of 179.587 mph. Teammate Jeff Gordon was a tick of the stopwatch behind, as four drivers topped 179 mph. The speeds were about 2 mph slower than what Ford drivers Greg Biffle and Kenseth ran to pace the earlier session.

There were no incidents reported in either session.

The key for Hamlin on Sunday is what it's been for the first three races of the Chase: keep Johnson in his sights, especially as the schedule gets to some of Hamlin's better tracks.

"There's really no weak spot [in] our program for the next four to six weeks," Hamlin said. "I think that we made it past the big hurdles for us and we only lost 18 points to Jimmie over the last three races. Now it's time to go out there and show why we are in this position."

Even if the No. 11 team slips at Fontana, Hamlin isn't worried. His opinion is that everyone will stumble somewhere along the way.

"I just think in the grand scheme of the Chase, as long as you just stay consistent, more than likely everyone is going to make mistakes here and there," Hamlin said. "It's happened forever and we've seen it. The first three races guys would go on runs and the first four races, guys wouldn't make any mistakes and we would think, 'Oh, you can't have a mulligan.'

"... We're not going to stay in that top five for 10 straight weeks. You just have to be patient enough to wait those things out and hope that you capitalize the most on your bad day and hopefully our bad day was last week at Kansas."

The key, according to Hamlin, is not letting bad days snowball into something worse by over-thinking.

"I feel like that is my own worst enemy at times," Hamlin said. "Your head really gets into it at times, but you have to just stay focused and stay light. The more pressure you put on yourself, [when] you go out here and you're not having fun by points racing, that's when you really go downhill. I think you have to enjoy the aspect of the racing itself."

And keeping focused on the task is one way Hamlin relieves the pressure.

"I think everyone has their best stuff on the race track and is focused on the big goal," Hamlin said. "We just hope that we have the best stuff when it counts.

"We definitely feel like our focus is where it needs to be. If we get beat straight up because our performance isn't good enough we can swallow that a little bit better than if we go out there and make a mistake on our own."

Related:
• Caraviello: Three-race Chase for those pursuing Johnson | Chase Coverage
• Five drivers in the Chase qualify 20th or worse at Fontana | Race Lineup