The NASCAR Busch Series headed to Dover, DE, to tackle the tough one mile concrete track known as the ‘Monster Mile’.  Driver Denny Hamlin was preparing to make his 50th Busch Series start of his career at a track that really challenged him last season.

During practice, the car was decent and with a few changes would be a top five car.  Friday evening, showers moved into the Dover area bringing scattered rain for the next twelve hours.  NASCAR would be forced to cancel qualifying and start the field by owners’ points.  Two hours prior to the green flag dropping, the skies cleared and track drying began.

Starting the event fourth and knowing there was a chance of more rain in the area, Hamlin was determined to get to the front early.  After getting a great start, Hamlin settled into the 2nd position.  Reporting that the car was a little loose getting into the corner, he did his best to hold his position.   By the time the first caution flew on lap 32, Hamlin had slipped to third and followed the leaders for some much needed adjustments.  Returning to the track in the second position, Hamlin wasted no time working on leader Carl Edwards.  After several attempts of diving to the inside, Hamlin took his machine to the high side of the 99 car.  After running a couple of laps side by side, he was finally able to take the lead.  Eventually relinquishing the lead, Hamlin remained in the top-ten through the halfway point of the race.  Only 10 laps away from a green flag pit stop for fuel, the caution flew and Hamlin followed the leaders to pit road.  Reporting that the car was loose at the beginning of the run and tight later in the run, the team focused on getting the car stable.  With a great stop, Hamlin returned to the track in the fourth position.

“Dave (Rogers) wanted to make some aggressive changes on the first stop but I talked him out of it,” commented Hamlin after the race.  “My car was not that bad so I wanted to be careful that we didn’t overdo it.  It was kind of tough because the rain washed all the rubber off the track and the more laps we ran the tighter & tighter it became.  We just got so tight on that long run, it was hard to hold our position.”

As the teams worked through several cautions at the end, the team gambled and pitted with 50 laps to go for four fresh tires and a final round of adjustments. The 20 car returned to the track in the 9th position.   As the race restarted, Hamlin battled lapped traffic on the tight one mile oval.  Able to pick up 2 positions by the time the checkered flag flew, Hamlin finished the race 7th.  

“We definitely made the right call at the end,” said Hamlin.  “We were not going to win the race with the car we had, so we needed to come get tires and try to make something happen.  Even though we finished in the top ten, with all the cars on the restart, it felt like we were in 18th position.  I just used up my car getting through the traffic and didn’t have anything left at the end.  Still it was a good day, so we will take the points and head to Nashville.”

Next week, Denny Hamlin will get a full dose of the challenges of his double duty schedule.  The NASCAR Busch Series will race at the Nashville Superspeedway on Saturday, June 10 at 8:05 p.m. and will be broadcasted on FX.  The NASCAR Nextel Cup Series will be at Pocono Raceway in Long Pond, PA for their event.  Assisting the #20 team this week will be Kertus Davis who will be helping to set up the car during the practice sessions.  Davis most recently drove for his own race team but has five years of experience in the Busch Series.