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RICHMOND, Va. – Denny Hamlin won a wild race at his home track, and the top four Chase hopefuls entering Saturday night’s Federated Auto Parts 400 all held serve at Richmond International Raceway in an event that ended in overtime after a record 16 cautions.
Jamie McMurray locked up a spot in the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup with a seventh-place finish, and Austin Dillon did likewise with a 13th-place run.
Sunoco rookies Chase Elliott and Chris Buescher both weathered some tense moments to qualify for NASCAR’s 10-race playoff, the first time two rookies have ever been included in the Chase field—and the first time any rookie has made the Chase since Hamlin accomplished the feat in 2006.
Elliott brought out the third caution of the night after contact with the Turn 1 wall, but he recovered to finish 19th to earn his Chase spot with room to spare.
Buescher, on the other hand, had to make a precautionary green-flag pit stop on Lap 308 of 407 because of a tire that was deflating and lost two laps in the process. But Buescher regained the lead lap during a spate of late cautions and came home 24th, his path to the Chase made easier when David Ragan, his chief rival for 30th place in the Sprint Cup standings, was eliminated in a eight-car accident on Lap 363.
Hamlin took control of the race when his pit crew handed him the lead under caution on Lap 322. Six cautions followed, the last of which sent the race to overtime when Regan Smith slammed the outside wall on Lap 399 of a scheduled 400.
Kyle Larson pitted for fresh tires under the yellow and streaked from 12th to second on the two-lap overtime run, but the driver of the No. 42 Chip Ganassi Racing Chevrolet didn’t have time to catch Hamlin’s No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota, which crossed the finish line with a margin of victory of .609 seconds.
Hamlin, who grew up in nearby Chesterfield, was elated to win the race in front of his home crowd.
“That’s what’s so special about it,” said Hamlin, who started from the pole and led the last 86 laps (189 total) on the way to his third victory of the season, his third at the .75-mile track and the 29th of his career. “You get to do it at home.
“I see all the extra Denny Hamlin shirts and hats and everything, and it just fires me up every time I get here. This was a great car, and hopefully we can use it in the Chase.”
RELATED: See all of Hamlin’s wins
Martin Truex Jr. ran third, followed by Brad Keselowski and Kevin Harvick. Kasey Kahne, who needed a victory to advance to the Chase, ran sixth after a hard-fought run to the finish. McMurray, Kurt Busch, Kyle Busch and Joey Logano completed the top 10.
With the exception of Kahne, all top-10 finishers on Saturday will compete in the Chase.
Ryan Newman‘s hopes of an eleventh-hour Chase miracle ended abruptly on Lap 363 when contact between his No. 31 Chevrolet and Tony Stewart’s No. 14 Chevy sent both cars out of control, blocking the track at the entry to Turn 3.
All told, eight cars were in the accident, but no driver was more incensed than Newman, who was racing hard with Stewart for the 10th position in a last-ditch attempt to make the Chase by winning the race.
“The No. 14 (Stewart) cut across my nose into Turn 1, and I got into him after that, but he’d already chopped into me and messed up my line, and I clipped him a little bit coming off of (Turn) 2,” Newman said of Stewart, who was racing at Richmond for the last time in a Sprint Cup car. …
“And then he just drove across my nose on the back straightaway. We’ll keep fighting like we always do. It’s just unfortunate not to end the way we wanted to. It’s just disappointing that you’ve got somebody old like that, that should be retired the way he drives. It’s just ridiculous.”
RELATED: Late wreck derails Newman’s Chase hopes
Not surprisingly, Stewart had a different perspective.
“That was the third time he’d driven into me during the night, and how many times does a guy get a free pass until you’ve had enough of it?” said the three-time champion. “He’s got to do his part racing for a championship, too, and to race to get in there, and if you’re going to run into guys — I go into (Turn) 1 and he dive bombs in there.
“I’m already coming down, so it’s not like I was trying to squeeze him in the infield or something. Ryan and I have been good friends. I don’t do that to him. But he hits me in 1, he hits me off of 2, and it’s like the third time by that time. There was once early in the race that nobody saw. Three times, that’s two more times than I normally let somebody run into me.”
And as to Newman’s suggestion Stewart should be retired already?
“He’ll get his wish in 10 weeks,” Stewart said. “He’ll get his wish. Maybe next year without us here, he’ll get his spot in the Chase that way.”
The Lap 363 pileup that ended Newman’s Chase hopes—and ended with Dylan Lupton‘s Toyota on the hood of Newman’s car—also locked Buescher into NASCAR’s playoff with the elimination of Ragan from the race.
“It was a crazy race,” said Buescher, the first driver to represent Front Row Motorsports in the Chase. “I can’t believe how many cautions we had. We got involved in one of the accidents, had a tire go down, just a very eventful day. Just so proud to be here.”
Elliott was just relieved to shed the stress of an eventful race.
“I just think we have to first off be thankful that we were able to get in tonight after the night we had,” Elliott said. “I can’t thank my guys for working as hard as they did.
“I’ve never had to go through—I’m sure they haven’t either—all the stuff we went through tonight, so hats off to them, fixing our car multiple times.”
Notes: With four victories this season, Kyle Busch starts the Chase next Sunday at Chicagoland Speedway as the top seed with 2,012 points, the same total earned by second-seeded Keselowski, also a four-time winner … With three victories and 2,009 points, Hamlin is the No. 3 seed, followed by Harvick, Carl Edwards, Truex, Matt Kenseth, Jimmie Johnson, Joey Logano, Larson, Stewart, Kurt Busch, Buescher, Elliott, Dillon and McMurray. … Truex’s No. 78 Toyota failed the laser inspection station after the race. If penalties are warranted, they will be announced before the Chase begins.
RELATED: Expansion vital for FRR, Jones | FRR adds Jones to growing team
RICHMOND, Va. — The official announcement came this past week, but that doesn’t mean Chris Gayle hasn’t been working behind the scenes in the Toyota camp.
Gayle, who called the action from the pit box in Kyle Busch‘s NASCAR XFINITY Series victory on Friday night at Richmond International Raceway, will move to Furniture Row Racing next season to guide the efforts of Sprint Cup rookie Erik Jones.
MORE: Busch dominates for XFINITY win at Richmond | Full race results
Though Jones won’t get a head start on his transition from XFINITY to Sprint Cup by running races at NASCAR’s highest level this year, Gayle already has been spending Sunday afternoons at the track, observing and learning.
And though Gayle has won eight XFINITY events with Busch at Joe Gibbs Racing this season, his is not exactly a household name. In fact, the only “Chris Gayle” with a current Wikipedia entry is a Jamaican cricketer.
But Furniture Row, which enjoys factory support from Toyota Racing Development and a technical partnership with JGR, expects Gayle to make a name for himself in short order as the crew chief for one of the sport’s rising stars.
And Gayle, 40, is using the rest of the season to get ready for the step up to Sprint Cup.
“On staying on Sundays and working, that’s kind of already started to happen,” Gayle said Friday night after the win at Richmond, site of Saturday night’s Federated Auto Parts 400 (7:30 p.m. ET on NBCSN, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). “You guys probably didn’t know, but I’ve been around for the last couple weeks if you’ve been watching a little bit, so I’ve kind of been doing that for a little bit and we’ll continue to do that for the rest of the year.
“Maybe not Furniture Row per se, but it gives me kind of a unique perspective for all the Toyota teams to kind of see how everybody’s doing things different and kind of mold my team how I want to, based on the goods and the bads of what I learn over the next 10, 11 races.”
Allen Iverson’s Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame enshrinement speech got emotional quickly Friday as the 2001 NBA MVP and 11-time NBA All-Star thanked Georgetown coach John Thompson “for saving my life.”
Amid heartfelt, tearful, joyful, thanks to his family, his Georgetown family, Michael Jordan, Michael Jackson (yes, that MJ), Jadakiss, Larry Brown, Julius ‘Dr. J’ Irving, his wife, Tawanna Iverson, and many more, A.I. also thanked Brendan Gaughan. Yes, that Brendan Gaughan, the NASCAR XFINITY Series driver of the No. 62 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet.
Iverson made NASCAR drivers proud in his thanks to his sponsor, too. “Gotta thank Reebok. A lifetime contract? Whoo!”
The Gaughan-Iverson connection goes back to the 1990s. Gaughan was a Hoya, too. Thompson tapped him specifically to make Iverson work hard and gain mental toughness in practice – by bumping him, beating on him. A bit like racing – banging doors, putting on the bump-and-run.
“Allen Iverson’s a lot quicker than me, and I was told to stop him [in practice] any way possible,” Gaughan told Philly.com in 2003. “Hold him, push him, punch him, bite him. … My job was to annoy the hell out of [Iverson].”
Gaughan offered that quote while defending his former teammate after Iverson missed a pair of free throws in a Philadelphia 76ers playoffs loss to the Detroit Pistons. He also said simply, “Lay off Allen Iverson.”
“Allen is one of the nicest guys I’ve ever met, and one of the smartest men I’ve ever met,” said Gaughan, who joked with the Inquirer that he himself averaged “0.2 points” before graduating from Georgetown with a business management degree in 1997.
That’s the kind of friend who gets a shoutout in a Hall of Fame enshrinement speech.
As the NASCAR XFINITY Series gets ready to launch its inaugural Chase, with Gaughan locked in, it bears remembering the No. 62 driver knows how to guard and bump and bang with the best.
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RELATED: Edwards throws bump-and-run on Busch
RICHMOND, Va. — The move that Carl Edwards used to win the spring race here at Richmond International Raceway, and cost Kyle Busch a victory, isn’t the focus this weekend as NASCAR Sprint Cup Series teams prepare for the final race of the regular season.
That doesn’t mean the last-lap contact has been entirely forgotten by the participants. Edwards certainly remembers it well.
“I can still feel Coach (Joe) Gibbs’ presence here from last time I was sitting here after the race,” Edwards said Friday in the RIR media center.
Both Busch and Edwards compete for the Joe Gibbs Racing organization in the Sprint Cup Series, along with teammates Matt Kenseth and Denny Hamlin.
But it was Busch and Edwards running 1-2 when the field took the white flag to begin the final lap in the Toyota Owners 400 in April. Then it was Edwards and Busch running 1-2 at the checkered flag.
Somewhere in between, specifically in the middle of Turns 3 and 4, there was contact. Edwards shot his No. 19 Toyota to the inside; Busch, in the No. 18, was trying to close the door.
The bump moved Busch up the track, and Edwards shot past for the lead and the win.
“Kyle and I talked,” Edwards. “We actually talked about it last night — Denny was nice enough to give me a ride here and we joked around about it a little bit.”
RELATED: Kyle tops leaderboard in opening practice
With all four JGR teams already securely in this year’s Chase for the Sprint Cup field, Edwards said the opportunity to just “go race, have as much fun as we can” is the gameplan for Saturday’s Federated Auto Parts 400 (7:30 p.m. ET, NBCSN, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR).
If the opportunity presents itself once again in the closing laps this time around?
“I don’t know,” Edwards said.
“I know if I were put in the position and the roles were reversed, I know exactly what to expect tomorrow night, but I plan on racing as hard as I can for the victory.”
Matt Kenseth will have a new member on his pit crew for the next several weeks as longtime front tire changer John Royer is out with an injury.
Royer injured his hand last week in practice and was replaced by veteran changer David Mayo at Darlington.
Moving forward, Mayo seems to be the logical choice to continue changing — and he’s on the team’s roster for Richmond, according to a Joe Gibbs Racing pre-race advance. Mayo spent time at Team Penske and Hendrick Motorsports before coming to JGR. His previous full-time role was with the No. 88 team of Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Royer is expected to return to the team sometime during the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup, according to the team
This is the second injury the No. 20 crew has encountered this year after losing longtime jackman Jason Tate to injury earlier in the year.
For more pit crew news, visit PitTalks.com.
RELATED: Qualifying results | Postseason Bubble outlook
RICHMOND, Va. — Chase Elliott certainly isn’t used to the view he’ll have from way back on Saturday night’s starting grid at Richmond International Raceway, but he sounded confident after qualifying that it would be a temporary situation.
Elliott will start his 3M-American Red Cross No. 24 Chevrolet from the 34th spot on the 40-car grid — the worst qualifying effort in the rookie’s brief 31-race NASCAR Sprint Cup Series career. But listening to the 20-year-old on pit road Friday evening after first-round qualifying, he was clear that the start may just make the finish more dramatic.
“I think for us, it doesn’t change our outlook or anything,” Elliott said. “It’s an unfortunate starting spot, terrible really. But we’ll think about it tonight and just try to look at what our teammates have. They were really fast and we struggled on our mock runs today as well. Hopefully our race trim stuff is better.
“The bad news is it’s a bad starting spot. The good news is it’s a long race.”
In two previous Richmond races, Elliott had finishes of 16th and 12th.
And all three of his Hendrick Motorsports teammates advanced to the final round of qualifying. Kasey Kahne was fastest of the three with a seventh-place effort. Toyota driver and Virginia native Denny Hamlin won the pole.
“This is a race track where if you can get yourself driving well, the stopwatch doesn’t mean a whole lot if you have your car driving the way you want it to,” Elliott said. “So I can’t say we have that either right now, but hopefully we will tomorrow night.”
WATCH: Buescher says he’s not in full defensive mode
RICHMOND, Va. — Jamie McMurray and Ryan Newman have adjacent garage areas this weekend at Richmond International Raceway. And Friday morning the two chatted briefly and smiled before climbing into their Chevrolets for practice.
McMurray, who is making his 500th Sprint Cup start, holds a 22-point edge over Newman for the 16th and final Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup playoff berth – and the field will be decided in Saturday night’s regular season finale, the Federated Auto Parts 400 (7:30 p.m. ET, NBCSN, MRN, Sirius XM NASCAR Radio).
It would have been an even closer contest between the two drivers, but Newman was penalized 15 points this week after his car failed post-race inspection following a eighth-place run at Darlington on Sunday. That turned a 7-point difference into a 22-point difference.
RELATED: Chase Bubble Watch | Clinching scenarios for Richmond
With many scenarios in play, Newman and McMurray each could clinch a Chase berth with a win. But Pocono winner and Sunoco Rookie of the Year candidate Chris Buescher also poses a challenge. He enters Saturday’s race in 13th place on the Chase Grid, ahead of McMurray (16th) and Newman (17th).
“I feel pretty good about our car after practice,” McMurray said of his No. 1 Sherwin Williams–sponsored Chevrolet.
“Richmond has actually been a pretty good track for me, finishes-wise and we’ve raced pretty well. Thought we were pretty good that first practice. I’m encouraged by the speed of the cars and hope to have a trouble-free night and that the race is just a normal race, you don’t get hung out by a caution or have something happen.
“Or,” he said smiling and pausing, “you don’t have a first-time winner. That could happen. But if the race plays out normal we’ve got a really good car and can have a really good finish.”
McMurray’s crew chief Matt McCall said he expects business as usual for the Ganassi Racing team. He acknowledged that, of course, the team will keep an eye on Newman, but insisted the best route for McMurray is simply to try to win.
“I guess every race you come to, you try to pay attention to what everyone else is doing,” McCall said. “We still want to come here and try to win the race. To me, that makes the easiest scenario.
“Anytime you start looking back, you go backwards. I’m a big believer in that. No different approach here.
“Jamie’s been doing this a long time and he’s not going to put himself in any crazy situations that he wouldn’t normally get in.”
RELATED: Chase Grid | Driver standings
For all the dramatic scenarios coming into the Richmond Chase-setter, only one time has a driver raced his way into the Chase with a victory: Jeremy Mayfield won the Richmond race in 2004 to earn a postseason bid.
Because of the penalty this week, the 22-point differential that separates McMurray and Newman is certainly wider. But these two drivers have raced right around one another most of the season.
Both drivers have one top-five and eight top-10 finishes in 2016. And they have finished within five positions of one another in nearly half the season’s races.
While McMurray is understandably glad to have gained a little more cushion, he seemed genuinely regretful it came by way of Newman’s penalty.
RELATED: No. 31 and No. 42 teams penalized after Darlington
“I’ve been on both sides of that,” said McMurray, who was penalized 25 points after the Bristol race in 2004 and ultimately missed the Chase by 15 points.
“As relieving as it is when you come here because it is a little different environment now [with Newman’s penalty], you hate it for that team, and those guys because you know they have worked so hard to get to that point and then to have it taken away sucks.”
Buescher, the 2015 XFINITY Series champion who won the season’s second Pocono Sprint Cup race, said he will also be cautiously aggressive Saturday night as he attempts to make his first Cup Chase.
“We need to race aggressively for every position, every point we can get without taking unnecessary risks,” Buescher said. “We can only control, what we can control. “We’re going out there to race and have a really good day and avoid the risks that would put us in a bad spot or possibly take us out of this Chase.”
“If we can see the 23 car (Ragan), for the most part, we’ll know we’re OK.‘’
Although both the veterans, McMurray and Newman, appeared cool and calm going about their Friday practice at Richmond, there was an unmistakable hint of what’s dramatically on the line.
“That would be huge if we’re able to pull this off,” McMurray said. “It would be great for our organization. To go from where we were to [teammate] Kyle [Larson] winning a race and both cars competing in the top-10 for the last month, that’s a really big step and not something that happens these days.
“Maybe 15 years ago you could do that. Now you can’t, so pretty phenomenal what they’ve been able to pull off and our whole group should be pretty proud of themselves.”
The celebration, he’s hoping, will come Saturday night.
