Hamlin trades in troubles for grandfather clock, wins Martinsville

MARTINSVILLE, Va. – Virginia native Denny Hamlin claimed the win on Sunday at the Martinsville Speedway, beating Martinsville-master Jeff Gordon by a car length in the Goody’s Cool Orange 500.

Joe Gibbs Racing’s Hamlin took the lead from Richard Childress Racing’s Jeff Burton, who claimed the last Sprint Cup Series event win on the short track in Bristol, Tenn,, on lap 427 of the 500.  He wheeled his way to the finish avoiding lapped traffic and running out of laps before Gordon, who leads active drivers with seven Martinsville wins, could challenge.

The win was the second of the season for Toyota after first visiting victory lane in Atlanta with Hamlin’s teammate, Kyle Busch. It was the fourth Sprint Cup win in Hamlin’s career, who worked his way through the racing ranks in Late Models on the quaint Virginia short track.

“It feels good,” Hamlin said. “To finally breakthrough here means a lot. It kind of feels like maybe the monkey is off of our backs.”

This season Hamlin and the No. 11 team has battled various gremlins from power steering to a fuel pickup problem, hindering his shot at contention.

“It’s been difficult. It’s hard to be patient. When you get so close to winning so many races… it’s tough to maintain confidence. It takes its toll on you.”

Also having his own amount of trouble this season was the pole-sitter, Hendrick Motorsports driver Jeff Gordon. Still winless this year, Gordon had a strong car early but was involved in a multi-car wreck on lap 57. With damage to the nose of his No. 24 Chevrolet he was forced to pit road for repairs. He spent the middle part of the event regaining the lost positions before reclaiming the lead on lap 269.

Late in the running, pit strategy was the name of the game with Gordon dropping into the pits with just over 100 laps remaining. Burton stayed on track, inheriting the lead. Hamlin pit but took fuel only. Burton held the point until Hamlin pushed ahead 73 laps from the finish.

Gordon made the pass around Burton for the second position with less than 10 laps remaining, setting his sights on Hamlin before running out of laps. Burton was third followed by Gordon’s Hendrick teammate Jimmie Johnson and Hamlin’s JGR teammate Tony Stewart.

“Our car was unbelievable the first half of the race. We played some pit strategy that I really felt was the right call. The car just never took off,” Gordon said. “We started making some gains on those guys and finally got up to second place. Pretty good day for us all things considered. We could have been a lot worse at one point.”

After slipping back to third at the finish Burton blamed some of his lost track position on the lapped car of Michael McDowell, who was making his debut in the No. 00 Toyota.

“I don’t think I could have done anything with Denny but I had started to run him down. The 00 (McDowell), he can do it the easy way or the hard way. He’s going to learn manners one way or another. I would like to think he can learn it the easy way.

“He did it all day long from lap one to lap 500,” Gordon added of McDowell unrelenting to the leaders.

While not making any friends with the veterans, McDowell ended the event 26th after spinning five laps from the finish.

Reigning series champion Johnson entered the event with three straight Martinsville wins to his credit and led on five separate occasions for 135 laps. Hendrick as a whole flexed their muscle at Martinsville with all four entries finishing in the top 10. Team newcomer Dale Earnhardt Jr. had no intention of letting Gordon and Johnson get all of the thunder as he too muscled his way into the mix, showing the way for 146 laps.

Earnhardt and the fourth member of the HMS conglomerate Casey Mears, were battling at the finish and gladly accepted an additional spot after Carl Edwards’s Ford ran out of gas and slowed off of turn 4. Earnhardt finished sixth and Mears seventh, capping off the organization’s most successful day of the young season. Mears was the only Hendrick driver to not lead a lap on the day but was in contention throughout the event, battling within the top 10.

Jamie McMurray was forced to qualify on time this weekend as the series transitioned to the 2008 owner’s point standings. McMurray entered the weekend outside of the top 35 but after a solid fifth-place starting spot and an eighth-place finish, sits 31st, securing a starting spot for next weekend’s race at the Texas Motor Speedway.

“I had to race those guys a little bit differently than I would have if we hadn’t been in that situation,” McMurray said. “When guys would get underneath me, I would just let them go because we had to finish well today so we could have a little bit of a buffer in the points when we go to Texas.”

Edwards slipped back to ninth after running out of fuel and Clint Bowyer closed out the top 10.

While Edwards and McMurray tallied steady runs, their Roush-Fenway Racing teammate, Matt Kenseth, struggled throughout the day. After being involved in multiple incidents Kenseth’s temper, normally under wraps, flared as he was penalized two laps for rough driving after spinning the car of David Gilliland. The two had made contact earlier in the event.

The race not only was plagued with 18 caution flags but also sour weather. Sunday was chilly with overcast skies blanketing the half-mile track. With rain in the forecast the event began with lap 250, the halfway mark, as the goal but despite an occasional mist, the heavy rain clouds stayed away allowing the race to reach its scheduled distance.

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