{"id":102779,"date":"2025-10-03T07:47:17","date_gmt":"2025-10-03T14:47:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/?p=102779"},"modified":"2025-10-03T07:47:17","modified_gmt":"2025-10-03T14:47:17","slug":"nascar-hollywood-casino-400-recap-chase-catches-hamlin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/nascar-hollywood-casino-400-recap-chase-catches-hamlin\/","title":{"rendered":"NASCAR Hollywood Casino 400 Recap: Chase Catches Hamlin"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"102781\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/nascar-hollywood-casino-400-recap-chase-catches-hamlin\/chase1-1\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/chase1-1.jpg\" data-orig-size=\"1000,531\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"chase1 (1)\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/chase1-1-300x159.jpg\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/chase1-1.jpg\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-102781\" src=\"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/chase1-1.jpg\" alt=\"NASCAR Hollywood Casino 400 Recap: Chase Catches Hamlin\" width=\"1000\" height=\"531\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/chase1-1.jpg 1000w, https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/chase1-1-300x159.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/chase1-1-768x408.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px\" \/><\/h2>\n<h2><strong>Power steering issues spoil the chance for Hamlin&#8217;s 60th win.<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>With an all-JGR front row, it really seemed like this would be another weekend where Toyota would triumph. That beacon of possibility shone especially bright for <strong>Denny Hamlin<\/strong>, who is eager to notch career win number 60 \u2013 and lock his way into the Round of 8.<\/p>\n<p>Unfortunately, <em>fate,<\/em> <em>circumstance<\/em>, or just <em>pure dumb luck<\/em> had other ideas for the #11 team. By all accounts, their race was executed nearly perfectly. However, with 37 cars on track, there&#8217;s always a chance for chaos in your average four-plus-hour Sunday race. Murphy&#8217;s Law persists, and if something bad\u00a0<em>can<\/em> happen, it very often\u00a0<em>will<\/em>. That&#8217;s a huge part of what makes wins so special.<\/p>\n<p>Despite winning the first and second stages and leading a majority of the laps, Hamlin was fighting the car for much of the race. A failure of the power steering system made the car a real handful to drive, and as the laps wound down, fatigue was evident. Regardless, Hamlin held on as best he could.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"NASCAR Cup Series 2025: Kansas playoff race | EXTENDED HIGHLIGHTS | Motorsports on NBC\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/jyn2d5xKqXY?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Hamlin would lose six spots on his final two-tire stop due to a jack issue, but fight back up towards the front on the second green\/white\/checker finish of the day. That second overtime would come thanks to <strong>Zane Smith<\/strong>&#8216;s wild ride along the fence that culminated in a pair of barrel rolls. Murphy&#8217;s Law strikes again. Smith&#8217;s wreck was caused by contact with <strong>John Hunter Nemechek<\/strong>, who had caused another wreck earlier in the day.<\/p>\n<p>The thrilling last lap featured a three-way attack on <strong>Bubba Wallace<\/strong> from JGR teammates Hamlin, <strong>Christopher Bell<\/strong>, and <strong>Chase Briscoe<\/strong>. Hamlin would edge ahead to take the fight to Wallace, but his continued power steering issues made car control difficult.<\/p>\n<p>He would end up making contact with Wallace, forcing the #23 to tap the wall and slowing both cars down enough to allow <strong>Chase Elliott<\/strong> to sneak in and grab the win, advancing himself to the next round of the playoffs.<\/p>\n<p>It was a frustrating day for Hamlin on multiple fronts. Prior to his contact with Wallace, the top five cars were all Toyotas, two of which were cars he co-owns at 23XI. To lose all of that to a Hendrick Chevrolet has to be absolutely sickening \u2013 especially considering that both 23XI playoff cars now sit below the cut line. It&#8217;ll be two weeks before he&#8217;ll be back on an oval, as the series heads to the Charlotte Oval for the cutoff race this weekend.<\/p>\n<p><em>Photo: Getty Images<\/em><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"mh-excerpt\"><p>Power steering issues spoil the chance for Hamlin&#8217;s 60th win.<\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":104,"featured_media":102781,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3424,3470],"tags":[127,41],"class_list":["post-102779","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nascar","category-news","tag-nascar","tag-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/chase1-1.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p42YSK-qJJ","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102779","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/104"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=102779"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102779\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":102794,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102779\/revisions\/102794"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/102781"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=102779"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=102779"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=102779"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}