JOLIET, Ill. — When it comes to oval tracks, Denny Hamlin has established himself on the throne as king of qualifying.
In Saturday’s NASCAR Cup Series time trials at Chicagoland Speedway, Hamlin beat Kyle Larson by 0.001 seconds to claim the pole position for Sunday’s eero 400 (6 p.m. ET, TNT Sports, truTV, HBO Max, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
Hamlin sped around the 1.5-mile intermediate track in 30.296 seconds (178.241 mph). Larson, who ran later in the qualifying order, fell just short at 178.235 mph.
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The Busch Light Pole Award was Hamlin’s fourth of the 2026 season, his first at Chicagoland (which hasn’t hosted a NASCAR national-series race since 2019) and the 52nd of his career, breaking a tie with Ryan Newman for ninth all-time.
Hamlin, the 2015 Chicagoland winner, won poles at the previous two oval tracks on the Cup Series schedule: Michigan International Speedway and Pocono Raceway. He is the only driver to win poles at both Chicagoland and the Chicago Street Course (2023).
“I’m the Chicago master — what can I say?” Hamlin said.
In fact, Hamlin considered himself lucky to win his third straight oval-track pole, having gotten the benefit of favorable cloud conditions.
“I don’t want to continue to underplay it, but we got very fortunate,” said Hamlin, who leads the series standings by one point over Tyler Reddick. “The last 12 cars had full sun — 100% sun. The last few had 90%, but I think that was the deciding factor.
“We saw that, right after I went, the track definitely got hotter, and it seemed like the corner speeds of those guys started to slow down. I think if there was one more car behind Ty Gibbs (the final qualifier), they definitely would have beaten us, because it went full shade. We got fortunate there, but they (Hamlin’s No. 11 team) did a real good job overnight with my car (whose balance wasn’t ideal during Friday’s practice).”
RFK Racing drivers Chris Buescher (178.153 mph) and Brad Keselowski (178.089 mph) qualified third and fourth, respectively. With two victories at Chicagoland, Keselowski is the only driver in the field for Sunday’s race with multiple wins at the track.
Hamlin’s Joe Gibbs Racing teammates Ty Gibbs, Christopher Bell and Chase Briscoe claimed the respective fifth through seventh starting positions. Bubba Wallace, Chase Elliott and William Byron completed the top 10, which consisted of four JGR Toyotas, three Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolets, two RFK Fords and one 23XI Racing Toyota (Wallace).
The No. 2 and top remaining seed in the NASCAR In-Season Challenge, Hamlin, faces Erik Jones in Sunday’s second round. Jones qualified 22nd.
In battles between teammates, Larson faces Byron, and Gibbs takes on Briscoe.
Hamlin, however, will have his eye on Larson.
“In my personal opinion, Kyle Larson is the best driver at this race track, so he’s going to be someone I have to contend with, and I’m sure all the Hendrick cars are.”