Charlotte Convention Center (Charlotte, N.C.) — Maybe the 20th time will be the charm. Denny Hamlin enters his 20th version of NASCAR playoffs. For a driver who ranks ninth all time with 64 career victories, he enters The Chase with the same storyline as the last several years.
Will he finally win a title or is his fate to be the best driver who never won a championship? "I've felt that many times," he told me on Wednesday during Chase media day when I asked him if this was his time. "You just don't know.
If things work themselves out, if things go the way they've been going, then yes, absolutely [it’s my year]." Hamlin has plenty of reasons to believe he won’t write a storybook ending, though. His father was terminally ill this time a year ago and Hamlin knew it would be his last chance to win a title while his father was alive. What he couldn’t predict was his father dying in a house fire in December.
So maybe fate just had to wait? Hamlin admitted before the season that it could go really well or really poorly. He has won four races this year and enters The Chase as the top seed.
"I certainly really wanted last year, but if you can win one, you're not going to be too particular on when it happens," Hamlin said. "But certainly, it’s been a rough, rough go over the last year. "So I really appreciate the racing gods sticking with us." Maybe the racing gods knew this would be a year he could challenge for the title.
The 2026 version of The Chase is more like the original than the one NASCAR conducted from 2014-2025, where drivers faced elimination throughout the 10-race Chase and the final race pitted four drivers on equal footing to determine the champion. The 2026 version is a simple 10-race mini-season, with 16 drivers eligible for the championship. As the top seed, Hamlin enters with a 25-point buffer on second and a 100-point edge on 16th.
Last year, Hamlin seemed poised to win the title, only to take four tires on a late caution and then ultimately, not being able to catch Kyle Larson (on two fresh tires) at the end. "It’s one of the best chances [for me] simply because it's likely not going to come down to one restart in one race," Hamlin said. "There's a big enough sample size now to where you know it's not that one singular moment or a caution that falls that is just so not great for you.
"And so I think that's kind of what gives us the best chance. Over the long haul, I like our chances." Hamlin drives for Joe Gibbs Racing but also co-owns 23XI Racing, which has two (Tyler Reddick and Bubba Wallace) drivers in The Chase. While he has always stepped back from some of his ownership duties in the postseason, he said he will try to focus even more time on The Chase this year.
Part of that is out of necessity. In the previous format of three-race rounds, there were times when he locked himself into the next round before the final race. That allowed him to coast for a week.
This year, there is no coasting. "I tried with my schedule to work out a little bit more time in The Chase to give myself a few more hours during the week to then dive into a few more details of maybe a specific track or trend or things like that," Hamlin said. Hamlin has won at all 10 Chase tracks in his career.
And at the eight Chase tracks where NASCAR has already raced at this season, he has earned more total points than any other driver. "Everything but Talladega [are my tracks]," Hamlin said. "We've had strong runs at all Chase tracks in the last year, whether it be in the last season or beginning of this season.
So the notebook is pretty solid." And if he wins the title, would the 45-year-old drop the mic and not come back in 2027 — the final year of a contract that he has indicated would be his last? "I wish," Hamlin said. "I certainly wish that that could be an option.
But I doubt it is."
