Hamlin confident with where he stands in Chase

FONTANA, Calif. -- Denny Hamlin didn't win the race Sunday, but he did accomplish his goal.

Hamlin's thought process was to finish strong and don't give up many points to Jimmie Johnson. He succeeded, coming away with an eighth-place finish despite being forced to start at the rear of the field due to a transmission change.

"All in all, it's a decent day. Can't be too disappointed with it, especially from where we started," Hamlin said. "It's somewhat uplifting that we got out of here with a top-10 day."

Hamlin felt like he had a car to compete for the win or at least run in the top five; however, he said the restarts hammered his efforts.

"Those restarts killed us at the end," Hamlin said. "We were terrible on restarts and I needed to go green those last 20 laps to catch the No. 48 and those guys. That was our Achilles' heel all day. We'd lose three or four spots every lap for the first couple and then we would make them back up."

With more than half the Chase remaining, Hamlin is content with where his team is in the points standings -- 36 points behind Johnson after four of 10 Chase races.

"We are in a decent spot, we're not in a great spot," Hamlin said. "We run better the second half of the Chase, we always have. At this point to be within whatever amount of points we are...I can take that and I can race [Johnson] from there."

In two weeks will be Martinsville, where Hamlin has three wins. Also coming up are Texas and Homestead, where Hamlin has one victory each.

"I'm definitely upbeat about the fact that we have some great race tracks coming up for us and we are putting those guys [the No. 48 team] in a position where if they make one mistake we are going to be right there," Hamlin said.