Joe Gibbs Racing Continues It's Dominace At Dover

Denny Hamlin gets drenched in Gatorade as his team celebrates in Victory Lane after winning the Heluva Good! 200 at Dover

The Joe Gibbs Racing trio of Denny Hamlin, Kyle Busch and Tony Stewart have been kicking butts and taking names in the Nationwide Series. Together, they have 9 wins and are dominant in the #20 car under crew chief Dave Rogers.

This week, 18 year old rookie Joey Logano climbed behind the wheel of the # 20 Toyota for his very first race in the series. He qualified 9th and finished an impressive 6th place in his debut. Some issues in the pits kept Logano from gaining the valuable track position he desperately needed. But all in all, he had an awesome first race and with crew chief extraordinaire Dave Rogers and the Game Stop crew.

But the man of the hour was Denny Hamlin in the Joe Gibbs Driven Hot Rod Oil Toyota. The car was financed exclusively by Joe and JD Gibbs and D Ham did not disappoint his car owners. After JGR teammate Kyle Busch, who was in the #32 Dollar General car of Braun Racing this weekend got taken out by fellow Braun Racing driver Jason Leffler, Hamlin took advantage of good track position and took the lead, never relinquishing the clean air and taking his 2nd checkered flag in the Nationwide series.

An excited, Gatorade drenched, slightly red-tinged Hamlin gave kudos to his young teammate Joey Logano and his 6th place finish. Hamlin had placed a side bet with a couple of the guys on his team that Joey would finish in the top 7 and made a little cash in the process.

Before the race began, Hamlin gave some words of advice and encouragement to Logano telling him to be patient and to just let it come to him. Seems like D Ham was the one who showed patience and avoided trouble to take the 18 car to victory lane. It was nice to see Denny smiling after the tough week he’d had following an on track incident with Brad Keselowski and the fall out from the post-race may lay that the press took off and ran with.

Hamlin’s efforts to show his frustration were misinterpreted as feelings of superiority and entitlement. Many Nationwide regulars took offense at Hamlin’s comments about Keselowski being “just a Nationwide driver” and not having the ability to race in the Cup series. Bobby Hamilton Jr. especially took the Virginia native’s comments to heart and expressed his dislike for the 2006 Rookie of the Year.

My personal feelings on the matter are that Hamlin felt that Keselowski showed inferior ability to his (meaning Hamlin’s) and simply meant that if he had more experience racing in the elite series he would have learned some give and take. The desire to succeed and impress the boss by winning at any price had gotten Keselowski in over his head and came back to bite him in the ass. I honestly believe that none of last week’s events would have taken place had the 88 not hit the 20 from behind under caution.

I loved the fact that Denny expressed his dislike for being made out to be the bad guy. I agree D Ham….I’m tired of you being the bad guy too. The best way to redeem yourself is to let your on-track performance do the talking and Hamlin did just that. Nothing backs up your smack talk like going out and winning the next week. Way to go Denny, you did just that. Congratulations on your Heluva Good! Win. You truly are the man.