Hamlin hopes to deliver title for Joe Gibbs

Posted on November 14, 2014 by Zack Albert

Title contender, team owner have long and unique history together

HOMESTEAD, Fla. — It’s a moment Denny Hamlin still remembers vividly, when as a bright-eyed 11-year-old fan of the NFL’s Washington Redskins, he famously told Coach Joe Gibbs that he’d love to win a championship driving for him someday.

Come Sunday, he’ll have another great opportunity to make good on his childhood dream.

Hamlin enters Sunday’s season finale (3 p.m. ET, ESPN) at Homestead-Miami Speedway as one of the four drivers vying for their first NASCAR Sprint Cup Series championship. As he has for the duration of his nine-year career in stock-car racing’s top division, he’ll be carrying the flag for Joe Gibbs Racing behind the wheel of his familiar No. 11.

FULL CHASE COVERAGE

• Chase hub page
• Chase Grid games
• #MyChaseNation

"It would mean a lot. I’m still with the race team that gave me my start and not only that, the sponsor, too," Hamlin said. "We have a long relationship with Joe Gibbs Racing and FedEx and even the team members that work on my race car that have been with me from the very, very start — it would be so gratifying to win the championship for them. They’ve worked their guts out and even though this year hasn’t produced results that we expect and the expectations that we expect to hit when we hit the race track, we find ourselves in a winner-take-all type format for one race and we know anything can happen."

In 1992, Hamlin was impatiently waiting at an autograph session to meet Gibbs, who had just finished leading the Redskins to their third Super Bowl title. The team owner was also getting his fledgling single-team stock-car racing operation off the ground with Dale Jarrett, now a NASCAR Hall of Famer, as his driver.

That’s when pre-teen Hamlin saw his chance to tout his still-developing go-karting skills, drawing what he characterized as a "there, there, now run along" type of response from the veteran coach. He also got the autograph on a hat he cherished, only to have the keepsake fly out his school bus window during one of his spells of restlessness on the ride home.

Hamlin said he "cried for two weeks" after the autographed cap went missing, but that he never lost his loyalty to the man who would one day become his car owner.

"He’s a great guy and what I love is that I’m driving for a family organization," Hamlin said. "I want to win it so bad for them because they are all in this sport. If their race team goes under they got nothing — they have nothing. To race for an owner that lives and breathes racing like Joe does and he’s at the race shop every morning when that shop door opens and that means a lot to me. There would be no other person more gratifying to win this for than him, especially a guy that I looked up to as a kid."

Hamlin’s best shot at a championship before this weekend came in 2010. He led the Sprint Cup standings entering the Homestead finale, but an early race spin left his car with splitter damage and an uphill climb. Jimmie Johnson capitalized and went on to secure the fifth of his sixth titles.

Gibbs said Hamlin was "absolutely devastated" by the defeat, taking the brunt of the blame. This time around, the coach says he sees a more mature driver on the cusp of a championship. Hamlin, for one, says he notices a considerable difference in his approach, four years later.

"Just playing this game way more relaxed," Hamlin said, describing his self-induced tension on the eve of the 2010 finale. "I didn’t do anything that night, didn’t want anyone coming in — just wanted to focus on what I needed to do, but that wasn’t what got me to that point. It was being myself and having my friends and family around — playing cards before driver intros, whatever it took to loosen me up. That’s what I did for 35 races and I changed that for one race and it won’t be the case this time around. Just racing much looser and having fun with this moment. You never know, especially with this type of format. Live it up and have some fun."

MORE:

READ: Latest
Chase news

PLAY: Monitor your Chase Grid Game picks

WATCH: Latest
NASCAR video

FOLLOW LIVE: Get
RaceView

Posted on November 14, 2014 by Nascar

Three of Championship 4 will start in top nine at Homestead-Miami

RELATED: Follow your picks in the Chase Battle Grid Presented by Toyota
MORE: Roger Penske: Nobody gets inside Joey’s head

HOMESTEAD, Mia. – No one stuffed it in the wall, no one cracked under pressure. And Kevin Harvick continued to needle fellow NASCAR Sprint Cup Series driver Joey Logano.

The first day of on-track activity for NASCAR’s final race, the Ford EcoBoost 200 (Sunday, 3 p.m. ET, ESPN) to determine the 2014 Sprint Cup championship concluded without a hitch for the Championship 4 contenders — Denny Hamlin, Harvick, Logano and Ryan Newman.

Fireworks failed to materialize, although Harvick did his best to stay front and center here at Homestead-Miami Speedway.

FULL CHASE COVERAGE

• Chase hub page
• Chase Grid games
• #MyChaseNation

Harvick was fastest among the four in qualifying, and his Stewart-Haas Racing No. 4 Chevrolet will start fifth in Sunday’s 43-car field. Hamlin (Joe Gibbs Racing No. 11 Toyota) qualified eighth; Logano (Team Penske No. 22 Ford) ninth and Newman (Richard Childress Racing No. 31 Chevrolet) 21st.

The pole went to Jeff Gordon, his third this season and the 200th for his Hendrick Motorsports organization.

With Logano and Hamlin conducting their portion of the post-qualifying press conference, Harvick walked into the room and made a beeline for the stage, ignoring a request to wait and join Newman on stage after the Logano/Hamlin session had been completed.

"Sit next to my buddy," Harvick said as he took a seat next to Logano.

"What’s up, friend?" Logano asked. "Long time no see."

It was a minor act in a major play and no one knows how much or how little effect Harvick’s antics will have come Sunday.

Two days earlier and a bit further north, Harvick was quick to reference the finish of an earlier Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup race at Talladega in which he felt Logano held up the outside line on a late restart, slowing Harvick and others enough to allow teammate Brad Keselowski to score the win and advance one more round.

"He knows I wasn’t joking," Harvick said at the time.

Gamesmanship aside, Harvick said he was pleased with his team’s first day on the track. And with access to data from three teammates, as well as the teams of Gordon and the Hendrick organization, there’s plenty of information at his team’s disposal.

"We know we can get better tomorrow," he said of the two practice sessions slated for Saturday. "We have a good spot to start in race trim and seven other cars that are running good to see some of the trends on their stuff today.

"All in all, we have a lot to look at and a lot of resources to pull from, and everybody is pulling the rope in the same direction, and we’ll just keep plugging away."

Logano, eighth here a year ago but a winner of five races this season, called it "an OK day."

The speed wasn’t there during practice, he said, but "once again, the 22 bunch kept their heads together, and we were able to make some good changes and found quite a bit of speed out of our car."

Hamlin, the defending race winner, likened the feel of his car to last year’s piece.

"I knew we were going to win the race," he said. "I knew in practice we were going to win the race, and my car feels equally as good this time around."

Newman’s the lone one of the four without a victory this year, a point he’s been asked about constantly.

The pragmatic driver hasn’t changed his outlook — he knows the task that awaits his team.

"We start 21st … and I don’t think that’s the end of our day," he said, "but my comment after qualifying was we beat half of them today, and we’ve got 267 laps to beat the other half on Sunday.

"We’ve got good equipment, good cars, good people. Our pit stops have gotten better. It’s going to be a crazy race, I think. It’s going to be some really crazy restarts, but I don’t think your starting position defines who’s going to finish there."

MORE: