Chesterfield, VA native Denny Hamlin captured Friday night's Lipton Tea 250 at the Richmond International Raceway. The No.20 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota driver took the checkered flag 0.789 seconds in front of Kevin Harvick.
The victory was Hamlin's first of the season and sixth of his Nationwide career. It was also the fifth straight win in the series for a JGR Toyota.
"This is unbelievable," said Hamlin, who lives about 15 miles from the track.
The key to the win was Hamlin getting new tires with 22 laps to go while the three lead cars stayed out for track position.
The race would restart with 11 laps to go. Hamlin grabbed third place on the outside from Mike Bliss in the first corner. He got Carl Edwards with 10 laps to go and slid underneath Harvick for the lead with nine laps remaining and that was the race.
There was one last caution flag and a green-white-checker finish, but Hamlin was not to be denied.
Pole winner Kasey Kahne led the first lap, but right from the start he was pressured by hometown hero Hamlin. Hamlin's Toyota was a little too loose at the beginning and he ended up losing second place to Edwards and then third place to Harvick before the race was five laps old.
Up front Kahne was in control until lap 18 when Edwards jumped ahead of him. The two drivers were more than two and a half seconds ahead of Harvick and enjoying things pretty much to themselves.
Slowly, Edwards began to pull away from Kahne, who fell into the clutches of Harvick and Hamlin. By lap 40 Harvick caught Kahne and slipped into second place, but almost two seconds behind Edwards.
Edwards was charging around the track and by lap 65 held a three-second lead on Harvick and lapped all but the top-20 cars. The gap was up to four seconds when a caution flag on lap 66 and erased it all.
After the flag and corresponding pit stop adjustments, the results on the track were very similar. Edwards and Harvick had the fastest cars.
At the 100-lap mark, Edwards and Harvick were still one-two and had again built a three-second lead. Fifteen laps later the gap was six seconds over David Ragan who moved into third place ahead of Hamlin and Matt Kenseth.
Then Edwards seemed to turn it up a notch and by lap 120 he was one second in front of Harvick. The change corresponded to a radio message from Edwards that he was going to dial in some more front brakes.
Behind them, Kenseth moved to third place, but still more than eight seconds behind the No.60 Ford. Then Kenseth gave way to Bliss as there was a pretty nice battle going on for third place behind the top-two cars. The pace had been so quick that just 14 cars now remained on the lead lap.
A David Reutimann spin erased Edwards' big lead and sent everyone down pit lane. This time the No.60 pit crew had a slow stop (19 seconds) and Harvick inherited the lead on lap 144.
So now it was Edwards who would have to find a way around Harvick. He hadn't found a way yet by lap 186 when Kahne spun and slammed the outside wall to bring out another caution flag.
Meanwhile, Hamlin, to the delight of his many fans, had worked his way back to third place. But scaring all the leaders was Kyle Busch, who had been a lap down with 80 to go and cracked the top-10 by lap 200.
Harvick held one second on Edwards, five seconds on Hamlin and 13 seconds on Busch. Busch would need a caution flag to realistically get a chance for a win.
And with 22 laps remaining the caution flag came out.
Who would pit and who would stay out?
The top three, Harvick, Edwards and Bliss stayed out, the remainder of the lead lap cars got four new tires. Hamlin was the first car in line with new rubber, fourth overall. Busch was fifth.
But it was all Hamlin from there and he called it his "biggest" win.
Bowyer finished ninth and will take a nine-point lead over Edwards to the next race. Busch is third, just 12 points back.
The next event is set for Friday night, May 9th at the Darlington Raceway.
