Who … should you be talking about after the checkered flag?
For the second week in a row, Denny Hamlin found himself at the back of the field as the race got underway. This time, Hamlin won the pole for the Firekeepers Casino 400 at Michigan international Speedway, but a repair to the No. 11 after qualifying sent him to the rear. Early on, Hamlin struggled to move forward. A record number of cautions helped Hamlin as the race wore on, and he finished eighth in stage two.
Once Hamlin was near the front, it was only a matter of time until he made a move for the lead, and once there. he hung on to lead twice for a total of 40 laps. There was concern about fuel mileage in the final stage, but the cautions worked in the teams’ favor, and Hamlin got the green light to run as hard as he wanted in the final laps. His lead grew from just under a second to five seconds, then 10.
By the time the checkers fell for Hamlin, he was ahead of runner-up Erik Jones by 11.110 seconds.
With his 63rd career win, Hamlin tied Kyle Busch for ninth all time. To honor his former teammate, who died last month of complications from pneumonia, Hamlin made a victory lap with a No. 18 flag — Busch’s number at Joe Gibbs Racing — that displayed the number fonts of both the Hamlin’s No. 11 and Busch’s Richard Childress Racing No. 8. The next driver on the all-time wins list for Hamlin is Dale Earnhardt. Hamlin needs 13 wins to tie Earnhardt’s mark of 76.
On the other hand…
For those wondering if Tyler Reddick would ever have a bad race, this was it — but even then, his 35th-place result wasn’t his or his team’s fault. Reddick was involved in a lap 83 incident on a restart when the field accordioned around him, and his No. 45 Toyota took the brunt of the damage.
It’s still a blow for Reddick, who started third and led 33 laps. He’s cooled off a little since starting the year with three straight wins, but his five victories still lead all drivers, and Reddick still holds a sizeable points lead. This was more of a reminder that he’s human than a setback, provided he can shake it off before the next race.
What … is the big question everyone should be asking after the race?
Sunday’s results bring up a few questions to ponder as summer kicks off. First, is it time for changes for two of NASCAR’s most decorated drivers? it has been over a year since either of the last two Cup champions has won a race. Defending champ Kyle Larson last visited victory lane in May of 2025 at Kansas Speedway, one week after 2024 champion Joey Logano got his most recent win at Texas Motor Speedway. While Larson has been strong enough to sit sixth in points this year, he hasn’t quite had the speed to pull out a win. Logano has been wildly inconsistent, which is very unlike him and the No. 22 team.
On the other side of the coin, Daniel Suarez is having a career year. After 15 races, he has a crown jewel win in the Coca-Cola 600, five top 10s and a career-best 13.7 average finish. Is it time to consider Suarez a weekly contender? And if it is, is he also a dark horse to have a strong Chase?
Back on board the struggle bus, Connor Zilisch had another trying day at Michigan. He was responsible for two of the 11 cautions and finished dead last. But Zilisch’s talent isn’t the real question here. Rather, would Zilisch have been better served by spending another year in the O’Reilly Series? It’s easy to criticize his slow start, but that’s because after his 10-win NOAPS season last year, it’s also easy to forget he’s 19 years old. He’s experienced for his age and made NOAPS looks too easy last year, but another year to build both his experience against strong competition and his confidence might have been a better path for a driver that young. There’s no reason to think he won’t eventually learn, but that curve has often proved steeper for drivers who were brought up too soon, Suarez being a prime example.
Where … did he come from?
Jones has been on a hot streak for the last month, and his runner-up finish puts an exclamation point on that, Jones had a great weekend start to finish, qualifying 10th before finishing second in both stage two and the race. His Legacy Motor Club teammate, John Hunter Nemechek, also had a solid finish on Sunday in 14th.
But the most surprising team effort of the day came from Team Penske. Logano, Ryan Blaney and Austin Cindric started 18th, 19th and 31st respectively and did not look like they had much speed to speak of after practice and qualifying on Saturday.
Their teams made the right calls during the race, though, and by the end of the day, all three cars took home top-11 finishes with Logano sixth, Blaney eighth and Cindric a very respectable 11th. As a team, they showed speed and strategy, and it worked out.
When … are we going to talk about the points?
With his first finish outside the top 15 and first DNF of 2026, Reddick saw his points lead slip to 51 points over Hamlin, the smallest margin he has held since he led by 40 markers after the second race of the year. Reddick is having a monster year, but Hamlin has eaten into his lead a little bit over the last few weeks before taking a chomp out of it at Michigan. Blaney remained in third this week, 157 behind. Chase Elliott had an early exit on Sunday and finished 32nd, but he gained 10 points on Reddick thanks to his stage two win. Ty Gibbs also struggled with crash damage on Sunday but held on to the fifth spot.
With 12 races remaining in the regular season, nobody fell out of the top 16 this week, but things are heating up around that spot among drivers hoping to squeeze into the Chase. After a much-needed top-10 finish, Logano is 17th, just three points outside the Chase picture.
Jones picked up three spots, climbing from 21st to 18th on his runner-up finish, 18 points behind Cindric in 16th. Ryan Preece slipped to 19th but is only one marker behind Jones, his 25-point penalty from earlier this year looming large for the No. 60 team.
Why … should you be paying attention this week?
The Cup Series makes its annual visit to Pocono Raceway this weekend. While the stage cautions have changed things somewhat, Pocono is largely a strategy game. It’s oval-adjacent, with three distinct corners and all left turns, but because of its sheer size, races can play out like road course events in terms of pit strategy because it’s possible to pit and not lose a lap.
The three corners pose their own challenges. They have different banking, different radii and different entry speeds and angles. It’s very difficult to set up a racecar to be perfect through all three; most teams settle for two and pretty good in the third.
Hamlin is certainly the favorite for the weekend with seven wins at Pocono to date. The only other active driver with more than one victory at the Tricky Triangle is Blaney with a pair of trophies.
Brad Keselowski only has one Pocono win, but his 10.7 average is the best in the field. Another driver to keep tabs on is Jones, who has been on a hot streak for the last month. His Pocono average is 13.5, sixth among active drivers, and while he doesn’t have a win there, he’s putting himself in position over the last few weeks.
Also, keep one eye on Christopher Bell this week. Bell suffered wrist and ankle injuries in a brutal two-car crash with Elliott on lap in Michigan. Bell hit the outside wall so hard that the race was red-flagged for just over 20 minutes to repair it, and it’s likely that that section will need to be replaced completely.
Bell’s car owner, Joe Gibbs, indicated that no decision has been made as to Bell’s status for Pocono. The team and Bell will reevaluate later this week.
How … did this race stack up?
Despite the record number of cautions and the margin of victory, there was a lot to like about the race — and some things not to like.
Despite Hamlin’s late dominance, there was plenty of good racing for most of the afternoon. The race featured 23 lead changes among 11 drivers and lots of hard racing toward the front.
Drivers were able to overcome early handling issues and poor starting positions to have good finishes. There was plenty of attrition, which was both good and bad this week. Teams failing to finish should be a thing, but parts of Sunday’s race looked more like Talladega than Michigan and that’s not really a great thing, especially with the speed the cars carry. Bell’s crash was brutal; he’s injured enough that racing next week is not a sure thing. Elliott also had a couple of hard hits, and Reddick’s car was destroyed. All in all, a dozen drivers retired early due to crash damage.
Overall though, it was a solid race. The Next Gen is at its best on the 1.5-2-mile tracks, and this week was a good show with some added unpredictability and chaos.
Amy is an 20-year veteran NASCAR writer and a six-time National Motorsports Press Association (NMPA) writing award winner, including first place awards for both columns and race coverage. As well as serving as Photo Editor, Amy writes The Big 6 (Mondays) after every NASCAR Cup Series race. She can also be found working on her bi-weekly columns Holding A Pretty Wheel (Tuesdays) and Only Yesterday (Wednesdays). A New Hampshire native whose heart is in North Carolina, Amy’s work credits have extended everywhere from driver Kenny Wallace’s website to Athlon Sports. She can also be heard weekly as a panelist on the Hard Left Turn podcast that can be found on AccessWDUN.com's Around the Track page.
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