{"id":18487,"date":"2015-09-21T10:36:08","date_gmt":"2015-09-21T17:36:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/?p=18487"},"modified":"2015-09-21T10:55:07","modified_gmt":"2015-09-21T17:55:07","slug":"hamlin-delivers-in-chicagoland-with-first-win-in-the-sprint-cup-chase","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/hamlin-delivers-in-chicagoland-with-first-win-in-the-sprint-cup-chase\/","title":{"rendered":"Hamlin Delivers in Chicagoland With First Win in the Sprint Cup Chase"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Denny<\/a>
Denny Hamlin, driver of the #11 FedEx Ground Toyota, celebrates in Victory Lane after winning the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series myAFibRisk.com 400 at Chicagoland Speedway<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Denny Hamlin had mixed feelings with the decision made by his pit crew to stay out for track position instead of pitting for fresh tires on the restart with only five laps to go.\u00a0 The Joe Gibbs Racing FedEx Ground Toyota gambled for clean air up front and when the green waved, Hamlin dashed quickly from third to the lead and on to win the first race of the NASCAR Playoffs, the MyAFibRisk.com 400 at Chicagoland Speedway.<\/p>\n

For a majority of the race, Hamlin was a lap down and struggled to get back on the lead lap, and did on lap 129 on a wave around after spinning out on lap two put him in the back of the field.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a great day for us,\u201d said a smiling and relieved Hamlin, driving with an ACL tear in his right knee.\u00a0 \u201cWe obviously came back from adversity and did a lot of great things throughout the day, with the exception of lap two.\u00a0 I tell you, it’s just amazing that we were able to come back from the way we were and do the things that we were able to do.<\/p>\n

\u201cI knew we had a really fast car. \u00a0I didn’t think starting in the second row with old tires we were going to have a chance. \u00a0But the opportunity came in turn one to make a move and we capitalized and our car took off.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was Hamlin\u2019s first Chicago win, his second of the year and 16th<\/sup> of his career, insuring him a spot in the Contender Round of the Chase.<\/p>\n

Runner-up Carl Edwards was one of the cars that hit the pits for fresh rubber and, like Hamlin, was at one time a lapped car and steadfastly mounted a charge to the front.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy guys just do a great job on pit road, they really do,\u201d said Edwards, now third in the points.\u00a0 \u201cDarian [Grubb, crew chief] never loses his cool, ever. \u00a0He played the game perfectly with pit strategy.<\/p>\n

\u201cThen at the end, truly, once we got into turn one on the final restart, I was like, \u2018I got this thing\u2019. \u00a0I got better tires than all these guys. \u00a0Kurt [Busch] was unbelievable on old tires. \u00a0Then I thought, Denny is mine, he’s a sitting duck. \u00a0He drove the wheels off of that thing and really hung on with those tires that he had.\u00a0 I was definitely surprised at Denny’s speed at the end and was really happy we got back up there.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Kevin<\/a>
Kevin Harvick, driver of the #4 Jimmy John’s \/ Budweiser Chevrolet, suffers damages from his run-in with Jimmie Johnson during the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series myAFibRisk.com 400 at Chicagoland Speedway<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Reigning champion, Kevin Harvick, who finished 42nd<\/sup>, had the wretched luck on the lap 135 restart of having Joey Logano push Jimmie Johnson so forward that he had to dive underneath Harvick and when space ran out on the apron, the two collided and that eventually put him into the wall with a cut left rear tire.\u00a0 He was none too happy about it, either.<\/p>\n

“I got a pretty good restart, and obviously, the 22 [Logano] and 48 got a good run, and I just held my line and the 48 just slammed into the side of my door,” Harvick said. \u00a0“That was pretty much it.”<\/p>\n

Johnson knowing there was nothing he could do about the car behind him had a simple explanation for the contact.<\/p>\n

“He was pinning me down, and I\u2019ve got to get back up on the track,” Johnson said. \u00a0“I wouldn\u2019t say that what he did is any different than other situations I\u2019ve been in like that. \u00a0When you\u2019re in Kevin\u2019s situation, you want to give that inside car a bad angle, so they\u2019ve got to lift.<\/p>\n

“I was fine with lifting, but I had to get back on the race track. \u00a0So I worked my way back onto the track. \u00a0I pulled down inside of him, and then we were door-to-door, as I moved back into the racing groove, that\u2019s when we touched door-to-door, tire-to-tire.”<\/p>\n

After the race, Johnson approached Harvick to talk about the mishap with Harvick physically expressing his emotion, putting a pointed finger into Johnson\u2019s chest and shouting at the six-time champion, voicing his displeasure.\u00a0 After being held back by a staff member in Harvick\u2019s organization, the two separated after the confrontation with Harvick leaving in his Chevrolet Suburban and Johnson heading back to his Lowe\u2019s camp.<\/p>\n

The top five finishers for the race were Hamlin, Edwards, Kurt Busch, Ryan Newman and Matt Kenseth.<\/p>\n

\"Chase<\/a>
Denny Hamlin, driver of the #11 FedEx Ground Toyota, adds his name to the contender list after winning the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series myAFibRisk.com 400 at Chicagoland Speedway<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Now that Hamlin has automatically advanced into the Contender round, driver Jamie McMurry is 13th <\/sup>in the standings, three points out.\u00a0 Paul Menard is four out followed closely by Clint Bowyer, six behind.\u00a0 Harvick is 22 points down.<\/p>\n

The MyAFibRisk.com 400 had an average speed of 140.117 mph with all 42 cars running at the finish.\u00a0 The race was accompanied by six caution flags for 28 laps.<\/p>\n

The next NASCAR Sprint Cup race goes to New Hampshire Motor Speedway for the running of the Sylvania 300 on Sunday, September 27, at 1:30 p.m. EDT on NBCSN.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Denny Hamlin took home his second win of the year at Chicagoland Speedway.<\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":18488,"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","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3424,3470,22],"tags":[3116,2993,1531,3358,3186,3355,1529,1528,2844,3115,3429,3147,1530],"class_list":["post-18487","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nascar","category-news","category-event-coverage","tag-carl-edwards","tag-clint-bowyer","tag-denny-hamlin","tag-jamie-mcmurry","tag-jimmie-johnson","tag-joe-gibbs-racing","tag-joey-logano","tag-kevin-harvick","tag-kurt-busch","tag-matt-kenseth","tag-nascar-sprint-cup-series","tag-paul-menard","tag-ryan-newman"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/51520972135739.rRUrlxQzMxJJwVOv7lLc_height640.png","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p42YSK-4Ob","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18487","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\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18487"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18487\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18497,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18487\/revisions\/18497"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18488"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18487"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18487"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18487"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}