Did You Notice?: Can Denny Hamlin Catch Dale Earnhardt?

Did You Notice? … Denny Hamlin keeps moving up the NASCAR win list? His 61st NASCAR Cup Series victory Sunday (March 15) at Las Vegas Motor Speedway broke a tie with Kevin Harvick for 10th on the all-time list. Already a lock for the NASCAR Hall of Fame, Hamlin’s now just one away (Kyle Busch, 63) from slotting in behind arguably the sport’s greatest driver in the modern era: Dale Earnhardt.

Most think that’s where Hamlin could end up when he retires: ninth on the list, ahead of a struggling Busch but far behind Earnhardt, Cale Yarborough, Jimmie Johnson and others seemingly on another tier of NASCAR’s Mount Rushmore.

Most NASCAR Cup Series Wins All-Time

Rank	Driver	Wins	Active?
6	Jimmie Johnson	83	YES
7	Cale Yarborough	83
8	Dale Earnhardt	76
9	Kyle Busch	63	YES
10	Denny Hamlin	61	YES

A whopping 15 wins behind Earnhardt feels, at first glance, to be a steep hill to climb for Hamlin. The most victories he’s earned in a single season was eight, way back in 2010, and he’d have to keep that pace for the next two years to match Earnhardt.

At the age Hamlin’s at, anyone will tell you that’s an impossible task, even the man-turned NASCAR broadcaster he just passed. Harvick got to 60 total Cup wins, in part, by having an age-defying season at age 44: nine wins, 20 top-five finishes and earning the regular season championship by a country mile.

But the following year, at 45, Harvick went winless; he only visited victory lane twice the rest of his career. As I’ve written about in the past, that’s the age where we start to see a drop-off in most drivers’ athletic ability: it’s when both Tony Stewart and Jeff Gordon ran their final Cup race.

Also consider Hamlin’s primary goal remains capturing a Cup Series championship, the one bucket list item in racing that continues to elude him. From this point on, capturing it would break the NASCAR record for oldest champion currently held by Bobby Allison at 45 years, 11 months in 1983. (Hamlin will be 10 days short of his 46th birthday at the time of this year’s Homestead-Miami Speedway season finale). Points racing in this new format might reduce risks, which reduce wins.

Add in the likelihood of retirement after Hamlin’s contract is up at Joe Gibbs Racing (he’s currently signed through just 2027) and it feels like another notch up the ladder is impossible.

So, why do I have this nagging thought he’s still got a shot?

Two words come to mind: Mark Martin.

The NASCAR Hall of Famer was supposed to retire twice: following the 2005 season and again after 2006 with Roush Racing. Martin never was able to do it. Instead, after a two-year, part-time schedule in 2007 and ’08, Hendrick Motorsports lured him back into a full-time ride for 2009.

Martin responded with one of his best seasons ever at age 50: five wins, 14 top-five finishes and second in points to Jimmie Johnson. That’s coming a few years after a 2007 Daytona 500 Martin lost by inches at age 47, eventually bowing out of the points lead due to his insistence to keep running part-time with Bobby Ginn’s team. His final career win total may have ticked up had he stayed with that No. 01 team the full season.

There’s also the ageless Harry Gant, one of this year’s NASCAR Hall of Fame inductees who had one of the best five-race stretches in stock car history at age 51. The man aptly nicknamed “Mr. September” shot out of a cannon with four straight wins, then posted a second at North Wilkesboro Speedway after fading down the stretch to Earnhardt.

These drivers show Father Time occasionally grants a stay in execution. So why can’t Hamlin be the next one to hold him off?

First, who says Hamlin will hold to this retirement “expectation” after next season? His future in the sport is secure as 23XI Racing co-owner; he’s been able to balance that with his full-time ride at JGR. Tyler Reddick’s three straight wins to start the season plus Hamlin’s Vegas victory show neither side is worse for wear.

JGR also has no clear heir apparent in the pipeline for Hamlin; none of their O’Reilly Series drivers are even inside the top 10 in points. In fact, they’re embroiled in a nasty lawsuit with his former crew chief and longtime JGR employee, Chris Gabehart, that has created a circus-like distraction. The steady hand Hamlin provides driving the No. 11 is needed within their four-car organization more than ever, especially with Gibbs 85 years old and Toyota still seeking two quality, top-tier full-time operations.

Of course, there were concerns Hamlin would retire after 2025, dealing with the offseason heartbreak of losing his father in that tragic fire at his parents’ North Carolina home. He’s also dealing with a recurring shoulder problem that he’s fighting through in the car this season in lieu of surgery.

But in the wake of Sunday’s win, Hamlin made clear that his love for driving is back, perhaps even serving as a healthy way to focus on his return to normal life amidst the grief.

“Days like today…” he said in Sunday’s post-race presser. “Last night, I was grinding still. I was working hours and hours and hours after this practice was over to try to figure out how we could make our car better, communicating with the team on that.

“It feels good when you get the cookie at the end.”

So, the fire’s clearly there. That brings us to Hamlin’s driving ability. We know from Harvick, Gant and Martin successful seasons are still possible at age 45 and beyond. Unlike Gordon, Hamlin’s first full-time Cup season was at 25 years old, giving him a little extra gas left in the tank. And drivers from previous generations like Allison, Richard Petty, Gant and Darrell Waltrip all raced to age 50 and beyond.

Hamlin’s win rate at JGR has also picked up a bit the last three years: an average of 4.0 per season. If that holds, he’d catch Earnhardt at the end of 2029, just a few days shy of age 49.

Just the fact we’re able to have this conversation makes Hamlin smile.

“It’s gratifying,” Hamlin said after his win. “Because I saw, like, the legendary Mount Rushmore guys, I’ve raced against them. I think probably at least two on the Mount Rushmore I got to race against and know how good they are.

“I also saw at the end of their career when they got to my age (45) that the performance changed, for whatever reason. I think Kevin Harvick is kind of the one that sticks out that he was still doing it at this level at this age… That was, like, motivation to me that, OK, it’s possible. Not everyone ages the same… that gave me hope that, like, I think that I can still do it.”

No matter what happens, though, Hamlin is still attuned to the reality every athlete faces: the end of his career is far closer than the beginning.

“I’m no fool,” he said Sunday. “I know my reaction’s deteriorating. There’s all kind of things that are deteriorating. Father Time is undefeated. Three months is a long time where it’s like, OK, am I still at the level that I was last year, especially to end last year.

“Today confirmed that nothing was changed, which is really good. It’s a good sign. We’re still able to do it at a really, really high level.”

And it keeps 15 more race wins, however impossible it might seem, within the realm of possibility.

Did You Notice? … Quick hits before taking off…

• Ross Chastain can shove Daniel Suarez around all he wants and say it’s about Sunday’s race. But you wonder if the frustration goes beyond just his former teammate. Five races into the year, Suarez sits 23 points up on Chastain’s No. 1 car with a team, Spire Motorsports, that’s typically looked at as a tier below. Chastain sits 20th in points, winless while teammate Shane van Gisbergen ranks above him. Now three years removed from his Cinderella run to the 2022 Championship Race, he’s had trouble repeating that success for any extended length of time since.

• For Justin Allgaier, the time is now. He won’t get a better shot than an extended Cup opportunity in the No. 48 for at least the next three races while Alex Bowman recovers from vertigo. It’s one last chance to show car owners he’s capable of moving back up to the sport’s highest level before hitting that dreaded age 40 this year.

Follow Tom Bowles on X at @NASCARBowles