Denny Hamlin’s decades-long quest to win his first NASCAR championship just got a little more complicated.
The longtime Cup Series driver has been one of the best on the circuit since his debut in 2005. His 54 wins are the most in NASCAR history by any driver without a championship, and his three victories this season are second-most behind only Kyle Larson (four).
None of that success has resulted in an elusive championship for Hamlin, who has wondered aloud whether he’s been afflicted with a playoff curse after a string of devastating finishes to previous title pursuits. And NASCAR has added even more fuel to the fire ahead of this year’s postseason.
Hamlin, No. 11 team issued L2 penalty for violating NASCAR engine inspection rules
On Thursday, NASCAR issued an L2-level penalty to Hamlin and his team for an issue regarding an engine inspection following his March 17 win at Bristol.
Teams are allowed to re-use race-winning engines during the season, but they must be sealed and inspected before they can be taken apart to ensure they were legal for those winning races.
Unfortunately for Hamlin, that didn’t happen to the engine from his winning car at Bristol. Instead, it was disassembled and rebuilt by Toyota Racing Development in a “grievous mistake” by the company, according to TRD president David Wilson.
As a result, NASCAR docked Hamlin and his team 75 regular-season points – dropping him from third to sixth in the standings – and erased 10 of his 21 playoff points. Hamlin’s win at Bristol also no longer counts toward playoff eligibility, though his other two wins still secure his spot.
The first penalty effectively kills Hamlin’s chances of winning the regular-season title, which was well within reach ahead of the final two races. The second means he’ll likely need to win multiple races to advance to the Championship 4, which famously hasn’t gone well for Hamlin in the past.
‘Curse’ continues for Hamlin in quest for 1st title
Thursday’s news is a crushing blow for Hamlin and the No. 11 team, which always seems to find itself on the wrong end of season-defining outcomes.
In last year’s postseason, Hamlin suffered from a mechanical failure at Homestead and missed the cut by eight points the following week at Martinsville. That was the site of his biggest heartbreak the year before, when Ross Chastain’s legendary “Hail Melon” left Hamlin a mere four points shy of advancing to the Championship 4.
Those weren’t the only close calls for Hamlin in his tortured Hall of Fame career.
In 2010, he was closing in on a potential title before running out of fuel in the second-to-last race and crashing in the finale. In 2019, he won the pole for the Championship 4 finale and was in second with 60 laps to go before a piece of tape cut off airflow to his engine and choked off another hopeful title run.
He’ll have two more chances to accumulate playoff points before the postseason, starting with Saturday’s Coke Zero Sugar 400 at Daytona International Speedway.