Denny Hamlin

Following that race, Hamlin finished 43rd in the Pepsi 400 at Daytona International Speedway after being involved in a wreck early on in the event.

This was the first-ever 43rd-place finish in his career.

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 three victories including Darlington, Michigan, and Dover in the No. 20 Rockwell Automation Chevy.

He also finished 1st at Milwaukee, but Aric Almirola started the car and ran 60 laps before turning it over to Denny Hamlin.

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 for a rookie in the modern era of NASCAR, and the highest since James Hylton in 1966.

Hamlin thus became the first-ever rookie to make the Chase for the NEXTEL Cup, which he finished third in points.

James Dennis Alan Hamlin (born November 18, 1980) is an American professional stock car racing driver and team owner.

He competes full-time in the NASCAR Cup Series, driving the No. 11 Toyota Camry XSE for Joe Gibbs Racing.

He also co-owns and operates 23XI Racing, another NASCAR Cup Series team, with basketball Hall of Famer Michael Jordan.

As a driver, Hamlin has won a total of 51 NASCAR Cup Series races, including the Coca-Cola 600 in 2022 and the Daytona 500 in 2016, 2019, and 2020; he is the fourth person to win the race in back-to-back seasons, alongside Richard Petty, Cale Yarborough, and Sterling Marlin.

Hamlin has the most wins in the NASCAR Cup Series without a championship.

Despite not winning the elusive title, he has been a perennial contender for it throughout his career.

Hamlin began his racing career in 1988, at age 7, racing go-karts.

By 1997 at 15, he won the WKA Manufacturers Cup.

At the age of 16, he was racing mini stocks.

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.

In 2004, Hamlin competed in five NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series 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 No. 10 Pontiac for Fast Track Racing, owned by Andy Hillenburg.

His final start of the year came at Darlington Raceway when he made his Busch Series debut.

He started twenty-seventh (rain-out) but finished eighth in the No. 18 Joe Gibbs Driven Performance Oil Chevrolet.

Hamlin ran the full season in 2005 after he replaced Mike Bliss in the No. 20 Rockwell Automation-sponsored Chevrolet in the Busch Series.

He ended up finishing fifth in the final championship points standings as a rookie in that series, with 11 Top 10's and earnings of $1,064,110.

Hamlin also ran his first NASCAR Cup Series races in 2005, making his Cup debut at Kansas Speedway as the driver of the No. 11 FedEx-sponsored Chevrolet.

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).

Then, it was announced the he would drive the No. 11 full-time for the 2006 season, after Jason Leffler was released, and made seven starts 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.

On June 11, 2006, 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, 2006, 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.

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.

Except for the 2013 season, in which a collision with Joey Logano damaged his lower back and kept him out for a large part of the early season, Hamlin has competed in the NASCAR Cup Series playoffs in every season he has competed full-time (17 seasons as of 2023), including his rookie season in 2006 when he finished third in the Chase for the NASCAR Nextel Cup standings, capping off one of the most impressive rookie campaigns in modern NASCAR history.

Since 2023, Hamlin has hosted a weekly podcast on Dirty Mo Media called Actions Detrimental with Denny Hamlin where he offers extensive knowledge of both the business and racing side of the sport along with his co-host Jared Allen.

Hamlin was born in Tampa, Florida, and lived in Chesterfield, Virginia, for most of his childhood.