DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — Since Denny Hamlin first arrived in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series full time in 2006 he had an immediate positive relationship with Daytona International Speedway winning his first-ever Budweiser Shootout as a rookie in the days leading up to the season-opening Daytona 500.
Since then, Hamlin has won that event two more times including this February — just 8 days before he pulled off an amazing last lap pass to claim his maiden Daytona 500 victory in the closest finish in the race’s great 58-year history.
A win in Saturday’s Coke Zero 400 would give Hamlin another unique claim to Daytona fame — a season sweep of the Sprint Cup events plus a win in the Shootout giving him three victories (including both points races) at the track in a single season.
Only Bobby Allison (1982) and Fireball Roberts (1962) have swept both Daytona premier series races and won an exhibition event too. Jimmie Johnson (2013), Cale Yarborough (1968) and LeeRoy Yarbrough (1969) are the other drivers to win both Sprint Cup races in a year.
“It was about five years ago that something happened on the restrictor plate race tracks where I just — it clicked and I got it,” Hamlin said Thursday. “I can name a few instances it’s really helped me, but I don’t want to necessarily say that, but I just feel comfortable. I feel like I know what I’m doing and the results have showed it.”
The driver of the No. 11 FedEx Toyota hasn’t finished worse than sixth in his last five Daytona starts, including a runner-up in the 2014 Daytona 500 and a third place showing in last year’s Coke Zero 400 — a streak of success even better than one of the track’s true superstars, Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Earnhardt has a pair of Cup race wins during that same five-race span — including the 2014 Daytona 500 and this race last year — but finished 36th in this year’s Daytona 500 and 14th in this race in 2014.
Despite the impressive numbers, Hamlin is well aware that his current success streak is a rare outcome at a restrictor plate track.
“Eventually, we’re going to get in a wreck,” Hamlin allowed with a slight smile. “I think we did at — yeah, we did at Talladega, but I’ve just been very fortunate on superspeedways and the bad finishes that I’ve had it’s not because something I feel like I did. It was something that I could caught up in, so I’ve been fortunate.
“It’s been a great battle with the 88 (Dale Earnhardt Jr.) probably the last four years with me and him. There’s been a lot of one-two finishes with us and hopefully I’d love to complete the sweep winning the Unlimited, the 500 and the July race. I feel like I gift basket-ed him that dual win on Thursday this year, so I’d like to get him back here in July.”
A win this weekend would be key not just in Daytona historical context. Other than a fantastic runner-up finish to Tony Stewart on the Sonoma Raceway road course last week, Hamlin hasn’t posted the kind of consistently good showings he might have liked. Especially with the way the season began.
In the last seven races, Hamlin has three top-10s and three finishes of 30th or worse — two of those sub-par finishes, a result of crashes.
But just looking at Hamlin’s face and his demeanor, it’s easy to tell he brings an unmistakable confidence to Daytona Beach. And he’s earned it honestly.
He’ll start ninth in the Coke Zero 400 — surrounded by all his three Joe Gibbs Racing teammates who qualified second (Carl Edwards), third (Kyle Busch) and seventh (Matt Kenseth). Toyota driver Martin Truex Jr., who Hamlin edged for the Daytona win in February, will start 15th.
“Anytime we can work together, I try for sure,” Hamlin said of his Toyota teammates. “I don’t know that it was a plot to take out one car by any means. I thought we showed a lot of speed with just our cars in practice looking at lap times with what we would run as a group of five. Simple math says what the pack was going to run and I knew that if we could stay in a line and commit to each other, it would be tough for others to pass us. It worked out well.
“Legitimately there were five Toyotas out to win on the final lap and that’s really all we could have asked for. It was something that was in the works for a long time and it was executed perfectly by our whole organization and it worked out. Obviously any time you are successful like that you try to repeat it, but the competitors have a lot of say in that, so there are others who are going to have issue with what our plan is.”
“Really this track has been very good to me throughout my career,” Hamlin said. “We hope to complete the sweep this weekend.”