Denny Hamlin claimed his second-consecutive Kansas Speedway win Thursday night in the Super Start Batteries 400, adding to his win last October at the track. Thursday nights win also was Hamlin’s fifth win of 2020, 19 races into the season, breaking a tie he held with four-race winner Kevin Harvick.
“We can win any given week, and that’s something that is really hard to come by,” Hamlin said. “This team is good at short tracks, intermediates, superspeedways. Have to thank FedEx, Toyota and the Jordan Brand, Coca-Cola and all of our partners at JGR. They’ve done a great job at building us fast cars.”
After Hendrick Motorsports teammates Alex Bowman and William Byron restarted on the front row on the final restart that followed the 11th caution of the race that came out on lap 242, Harvick and Hamlin took the top-two positions in the running order. Hamlin took his race-winning lead from Harvick on lap 255.
“I don’t know that we had the best car; we definitely had a top-three car all day,” Hamlin said. “Just went and got it there at the end. I saw the 4 (Harvick) get loose and, usually, when you’re loose, you’re not able to run up high. That was a benefit for us to be able to get that momentum going. The pit crew did an amazing job getting us out there ahead of everyone else that had four tires. Proud of this whole FedEx team. We’ve had a rough three weeks. We were leading at Indy when we blew a tire, and this team is really hitting on all cylinders right now.”
Harvick fell back to fourth by the checkered flag.
“We needed a miracle,” Harvick said. “Our Busch Light Apple Ford Mustang was really loose. We got a couple good restarts and had a couple good laps, but we were in trouble, there, regardless if it didn’t just keep going yellow. Our guys did a good job keeping us in the fight all night, but we definitely have some work to do.”
Defending Super Start Batteries 400 winner Brad Keselowski took runner-up honors, and one of Hamlin’s Joe Gibbs Racing teammates, Martin Truex Jr., finished third to give JGR two cars in the top-three of the finishing order. Three of the four JGR cars finished in the top-five, with Erik Jones in fifth.
“I thought Denny and I were probably pretty close to equal the second half of the night,” Keselowski said. “It was just a matter of who got out in front. We didn’t get out in front on the restarts, there, and he was able to take advantage and bring home the win. All in all, it was still a really good day.”
The remaining JGR entry of reigning series champion Kyle Busch finished just outside the top-10 in 11th position after he hit the wall and, as a result, made a green-flag pit stops inside the final 50 laps. Aside from Hamlin’s race-leading 57 laps-led, Busch was the only other driver to lead over 50 laps, running up front for 52 laps. Most of those laps led came in the opening 80-lap stage, on his way to the stage-one winner. That stage win was Busch’s first for the season.
“That wasn’t the finish this M&Ms Fudge Brownie Camry deserved today,” Busch said. “We were tight most of the race, and I just got into the wall, there. We are making progress and think we showed that tonight. We will go back, get ready and head to New Hampshire next week.”
Ryan Blaney, who also led laps earlier in the race, got into the wall on the same time as Busch, and like Busch, Blaney also had to make an unscheduled, green-flag pit stop. But unlike Busch, Blaney didn’t get back on the lead lap. Instead, he wound up 20th at the checkered flag.
After Joey Logano took the lead from pole-sitter Harvick on the opening lap, and Truex took the lead on pit road during a lap-25 competition caution, Busch took his stage-one-winning lead on a lap-31 restart.
Logano, after pitting from the lead during the competition caution was penalized for an uncontrolled tire. He was involved in a crash on lap 176.
“I felt it going into three right before we took the green, and I felt it kind of landing on the splitter and, honestly, thought that the left-front shock went bad,” Logano said. “It wasn’t like it was flat, it was just down a little bit. Maybe it was bad judgement on my part. I just thought it wasn’t that bad and didn’t want to lose all our track position for something I wasn’t sure of. Hindsight is 20-20, and I apologize to everyone that was involved in it. It just stinks. It is one of those judgement calls. You are coming to the green and swerving your tires and something feels funny and you just aren’t sure. I was pretty sure coming off of two, and it loaded up and got on the splitter. Just a bummer. I felt like we got our Shell Pennzoil Mustang pretty good that last run. We felt loose that whole time, but the last run, we were close to where we needed to be. I wish we could have finished it out, because I feel like we would have had something.”
Hamlin was the first out of the pits during the caution between the first two stages, but on lap 97 he lost that lead to Truex.
Keselowski won the second stage. He took his first lead with a two-tire pit stop during a lap-100 caution. Truex retook the lead on lap 115 before Blaney, utilizing the same strategy of his Team Penske teammate Keselowski before him, got the lead with a two-tire stop during a lap-143 caution. Keselowski, though, retook the lead on with one lap remaining in the stage.
Hamlin was up front for the start of the final 107-lap stage after a fuel-only stop and remained up front until Truex took the lead on lap 193. Byron inherited the lead by staying out during a lap-195 caution but lost the lead to Keselowski on lap 206. Byron, despite running on older tires, retook the lead on lap 221 and remained in the lead until his teammate, Bowman, took the top spot on a lap-240 restart.
Aric Almirola finished sixth, Cole Custer was seventh, Bowman eighth, Kurt Busch ninth, and Byron finished 10th.
