Why veteran driver Denny Hamlin could finally win his first Cup Series title
On a sunny day last season in Martinsville, Va., Denny Hamlin exited his No. 11 Toyota Camry once more denied a NASCAR Cup Series championship.
The veteran driver, who hails from Chesterfield, Va., a three-hour drive from Martinsville, had been knocked out of the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs and would be ineligible for the championship at Phoenix a week later.
Turn back the clock one year prior, and he was exiting his car disappointed at Martinsville again, this time after Ross Chastain pulled off one of the most improbable moves in NASCAR history on the final lap to reach the Championship 4. In 2021, he finished third of the four Championship 4 drivers at Phoenix, and in 2020, he finished fourth in the points, a disappointing end to a season in which he won seven times.
So close, but no championship for the man who has won everything in the sport except a title. So, could this finally be the years he earns that elusive title?
Hamlin, who turns 44 in November, is off to a roaring start, winning the Busch Light Clash on Saturday night at the Los Angeles Coliseum.
“It’s just a great momentum boost," he said afterward, per NASCAR.com. "It doesn’t do much more than that, but I clean off all the trophies every Jan. 1 in the entryway to the house, and now we get to add one pretty quick, so I’m really happy about that.”
Hamlin doesn't lack confidence, but confidence alone doesn't win titles. A driver needs a quality team. Hamlin has one, led by crew chief Chris Gabehart and a Joe Gibbs Racing pit crew that is consistently quick on pit road.
While Hamlin hasn't won more than three races in a season since 2020, he was consistently fast week in and week out last season, and with a new body for the whole of Toyota in 2024, why can't he go out and win five or six races?
"Every seven days, I have a shot to win a race, and not many people can say that," Hamlin said in an interview with Fox Sports' Bob Pockrass last fall.
Stacking wins would certainly help him advance through the Playoffs. You can't win the championship if you don't make the Championship 4 in the first place, and while Hamlin's round of 8 exits haven't fallen squarely on his shoulders, (see Chastain's bonzai move at Martinsville in 2022 and a mechanical failure at Homestead in 2023), getting back to the Championship 4 seems imperative as Father Time slowly encroaches.
At 43, Hamlin may not have much time left as a driver, but with his confidence sky high and a fast car, that elusive first title may not be far off.
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