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| Born | November 18, 1980 | ||||||
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| Hometown | Chesterfield, Virginia | ||||||
| Awards | 2006 Raybestos Rookie of the Year | ||||||
| NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Statistics | |||||||
| Car #, Team | #11 - Joe Gibbs Racing | ||||||
| 2008 Sprint Cup Position | 8th | ||||||
| Best Cup Position | 3rd - 2006 (Nextel Cup) | ||||||
| First Race | 2005 Banquet 400 (Kansas) | ||||||
| First Win | 2006 Pocono 500 (Pocono) | ||||||
| Last Win | 2008 Goody's Cool Orange 500 (Martinsville) | ||||||
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| NASCAR Nationwide Series Statistics | |||||||
| Car #, Team | #20 - Joe Gibbs Racing | ||||||
| 2008 NNS Position | 19th | ||||||
| Best NNS Position | 4th - 2006 | ||||||
| First Race | 2004 BI-LO 200 (Darlington) | ||||||
| First Win | 2006 Telcel-Motorola 200 (Mexico City) | ||||||
| Last Win | 2008 Kansas Lottery 300 (Kansas) | ||||||
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| NASCAR Camping World Truck Series Statistics | |||||||
| First Race | 2004 Power Stroke Diesel 200 (IRP) | ||||||
| Last Race | 2008 E-Z-GO 200 (Atlanta) | ||||||
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| Statistics current as of March 14, 2009. | |||||||
James Dennis Alan Hamlin, Jr. (born November 18, 1980 in Chesterfield, Virginia) is an American race car driver. He currently drives the #11 Fedex Camry Car for Joe Gibbs Racing in the NASCAR Sprint Cup series.
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Career
Racing prior to NASCAR
Hamlin began his racing career in 1988, at the age of 7 years old, racing go-karts. By 1997 at 15 he won the WKA manufacturers cup at the age of 16, he was racing Ministocks. In his first stock car race, at Langley Speedway, Hamlin won the pole position, and won the race. He then progressed to the Grand Stock division in 1998, and moved on to Late Model Stock Cars in 2000. In 2002, he won ten Late Model races, and surpassed that in 2003 with 25 wins, and 30 poles, out of 36 races. In 2004, while competing full time in Late Model Stock Cars, Hamlin was signed to a driver development contract with Joe Gibbs Racing.
NASCAR career
2004-2006
In 2004, Hamlin competed in five NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series (NCTS) races with EJP Racing, and had a tenth-place finish in his NASCAR debut at Indianapolis Raceway Park. He later ran his first career ARCA RE/MAX Series race at Talladega Superspeedway, finishing third in the #10 Pontiac owned by Andy Hillenburg. His final start of the year came at Darlington Raceway, when he made his Busch Series debut. He qualified twenty-seventh but finished eighth in the #18 Joe Gibbs Driven Performance Oil Chevy.
Hamlin ran the full season in 2005 after he replaced Mike Bliss in the #20 Rockwell Automation Chevrolet in the Busch Series. He ended up finishing 5th in the final championship points standings as a rookie in that series, with 11 top 10's and earnings of $1,064,110.00. Hamlin also ran his first Nextel Cup Series races in 2005, making his Cup debut at Kansas Speedway as driver of the #11 FedEx Chevrolet for the 2006 season, after Jason Leffler was released, and made seven starts in in the Cup series in 2005. He finished the Cup season with three top 10 finishes in those seven starts and one pole at Phoenix International Raceway.
In 2006, Hamlin ran his first full season in the NASCAR Nextel Cup Series, and during the year he drove in both the Nextel Cup and Busch Series full-time. In Hamlin's first restrictor plate race as a Nextel Cup driver, he beat all the previous year's (2005 season) pole winners in the 70-lap 2006 Budweiser Shootout. Hamlin became the first Rookie of the Year candidate to take home the Shootout victory. Hamlin achieved his first career Busch Series victory at Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez (March 5). On June 11, Hamlin scored his first career Cup Series win at the Pocono 500, where he also won his second career pole. He achieved his second career win on July 23, in the Pennsylvania 500 also at Pocono Raceway becoming only the 2nd rookie in Nextel Cup history to sweep both races at a track during the same season (Jimmie Johnson did so at Dover International Speedway in his rookie season in 2002), both from the pole position. In the Cup Series, Hamlin won the Raybestos Rookie of the Year award and finished third in the final Cup standings, scoring the highest points finish ever for a rookie in the modern era of NASCAR. Hamlin thus became the first ever rookie to make the Chase for the NEXTEL Cup.
2007-present
Hamlin started the 2007 Cup season by finishing 28th in the Daytona 500. He won his third career cup race at the Lenox Industrial Tools 300 at New Hampshire International Speedway. Hamlin clinched a spot in the Chase for the Cup and was seeded sixth, 50 points behind the leader, but finished 12th overall in the final standings. In the Nationwide Series, Hamlin scored victory three time including Darlington, Michigan, and Dover in the #20 Rockwell Automation Chevy.
In 2008, Hamlin had a near identical season as before, but moved up to eighth in points, and won early in the season at Martinsville Speedway. He won three races in the Nationwide Series, driving both the #18 and #20 entries for Gibbs, as well as the #32 Dollar General/Haas Avocados Toyota Camry for Braun Racing. He will continue driving the #11 Toyota in Sprint Cup in 2009, as well as sharing the #20 Toyota for Gibbs in the Nationwide Series.
References
External links
- Denny Hamlin's official website
- Driver's statistics at racing-reference.info
- Hamlin Career History at Joe Gibbs Racing site
| Preceded by Kyle Busch | NASCAR Raybestos Rookie of the Year 2006 | Succeeded by Juan Pablo Montoya |
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