Hamlin Scores Career Best Finish at Milwaukee

After moving up to sixth in the NASCAR Busch Series Drivers Points, the #20 Rockwell Automation / JGR team headed to the oldest track on the NASCAR circuit, The Milwaukee Mile. The legendary track that is 102 years old is in the backyard of Rockwell Automation’s Corporate Headquarters. With many fans and customers in attendance, Denny Hamlin and his team was ready to put on a show.
 
The SBC 250 was scheduled as a one day event with practice in the morning, qualifying in the late afternoon and racing the same evening. The #20 car was strong in practice showing third and sixth on the board in practice times. Hamlin smashed his fast time of the day during qualifying and secured the second starting position, his best in a Busch Series Race.
 
After an extremely hot afternoon, the sun began to set and the temperatures began to cool. As the race began, Hamlin lost a couple positions early trying to get to the bottom of the track to run the preferred line. Settling into the 4 ^th position, he reported that the car was extremely tight especially in the center of the corner. When the first caution flag flew on lap 20, Hamlin followed the leaders to pit road. Crew Chief Cully Barraclough elected to save tires and just add fuel and made a wedge adjustment to help the handling of the car.

Restarting in the 16 ^th position, behind 15 cars that did not pit, Hamlin began to work his way to the front. He was as high as 10 ^th ; when the cars that elected to take tires finally caught up to Hamlin and began to pass him. In the middle of long green flag run, the cars that stayed out from the early caution were forced to pit. As the long green flag run continued, Barraclough called for Hamlin to make a stop on lap 84 surrendering the 6 ^th position. Still tight, Barraclough made a track bar adjustment in addition to four much needed tires. Hamlin returned to the track and worked his way up to the 8 ^th position when the caution flag flew on lap 113. Following the leaders to pit road, the #20 team changed four tires & fuel with a scare. Reminiscent of Kentucky last week, a tire began to roll out of the box when front tire carrier, Mikey Drake caught it and returned it to the pit wall.
 
As the race resumed on lap 151, Hamlin was running in the 8^th position. He quickly began to work his way up to the 6^th position. Fighting the tight condition that bothered him all evening, as the tires wore off so did the condition. Running some of his best laps of the night and beginning to catch the leader, rain drops began to the fall. The race was red flagged on lap 200 as NASCAR attempted to dry the track. As soon as the track was almost ready, another storm system moved into the area and the race was called due to adverse circumstances. Hamlin would be scored in the sixth position on the same lap as the leader.

“This team continues to get better each week,” commented Hamlin following the race. “We had our best finish and best starting position of the season. Cully has been working on the cars and I am starting to get the feel that I have been looking for. I really wanted to finish this race because we were the only team that still had a set of sticker tires. Everyone was going to have to make one more stop for fuel and with new tires, we should have finished in the top three.”