MARTINSVILLE, Va. — Denny Hamlin has enjoyed something of a home-state advantage at Martinsville Speedway, where the smoky burnouts for his five wins through the years have been cheered by mostly adoring fans.
The home-field faithful made a dramatic turn Sunday night in Martinsville’s first prime-time finish under artificial light, lustily booing the Commonwealth native for the late-race tactics that denied Chase Elliott another shot at his first Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series win.
That same court of public opinion swung its heft behind the young Elliott, who egged on fans to a boisterous din that muffled Hamlin’s post-race interview, simulcast on the track’s big-screen ISM Vision display.
RELATED: Get full race results
Hamlin emphasized that the stakes for postseason-eligible drivers this time of the year are stratospheric, with Victory Lane visits meaning berths in the championship round at Homestead-Miami Speedway next month. That, he said, meant more than winning a popularity contest in what was formerly friendly territory.
“I don’t care about that,” Hamlin said. “I’m just trying to get to Homestead.”
MORE: Hamlin tweets apology to Elliott
And so was Elliott, whipping the crowd into anticipation each of the four times he took the lead in Sunday’s First Data 500. The table was set for another “We’re going to Homestead!” moment for the driver of the No. 24, with Elliott poised to reprise Jeff Gordon’s title-round clincher from two years ago. That bit of Martinsville magic came on yet another chilly autumn day under the onset of darkness at NASCAR’s oldest venue.
This year’s Martinsville moment for Elliott fizzled two laps before the scheduled end when Hamlin drove in aggressively in Turn 3, sending Elliott’s Chevrolet looping off his No. 11 Toyota’s nose and into the outside retaining wall.
WATCH: Hamlin makes contact with Elliott
That sent the event — the opener to the three-race Round of 8 — into overtime and stirred the crowd’s voice to new decibel levels. That ruckus heightened when Elliott broadsided Hamlin after the checkered flag and the two rivals exchanged words on the backstretch.
“Well, it’s just unnecessary,” said Elliott, who waved his arms toward the frontstretch grandstand to fan the emotional flames. “I think these fans have been coming here a long time and they know when somebody gets wrecked and when somebody had a nice fight for the lead, and that wasn’t one. That’s it.”
The fans have been coming here for a long time — 70 years to be precise — all lured in by the special brand of full-contact racing that has long been the .526-mile track’s calling card.
The addition of a high-tech LED lighting system has given Martinsville new capabilities for nighttime events. The existing capabilities — for producing slam-bang finishes and new rivalries with an overflow of emotion — remain captivating in their own right.
“All’s fair in this deal …,” Hamlin said. “Any time you get to a race track like this and get late-race restarts and you know that you have a Cup Series championship chance on the line, that’s what’s going to happen.”
