RICHMOND, Va. — Friday was a good day for Denny Hamlin.
First, he earned the pole for Saturday’s Crown Royal Presents the Dan Lowry 400 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race at Richmond Int’l Raceway, and then he out-smarted Kevin Harvick to win the Lipton Tea 250 for the NASCAR Nationwide Series.
“When those guys (Harvick, Carl Edwards and third-place Mike Bliss) stayed out, I knew this was our race to lose,” Hamlin gushed. “It was our race. I told them (his crew) that, that I knew it. Kevin had a hard decision to make, and I knew that one of these days, circumstances were going to come out in our favor.
“That’s the way it happened tonight.”
Hamlin, born and raised about 15 minutes up the road from RIR in Chesterfield, led a parade of cars onto pit road with 22 laps to go, taking four tires and fuel in 15.35 seconds. The first three cars, driven by Harvick, Edwards and Bliss, stayed out for track position.
Crew chief Dave Rogers ordered the stop, saying it was a no-brainer.

SPLISH, SPLASH: Denny Hamlin gets a celebratory shower Friday night at Richmond Int'l Raceway. (HHP/Harold Hinson Photo)

“We knew the only way we could steal this one was to come in and put four tires on it,” Rogers said. “We were a third-place car all day. Track position is so important, and you can’t fault Kevin and those guys. They were in a hard place, and I’ve been in that situation before.
“We were third, and we knew we couldn’t pass them if we didn’t come to pit road.”
Hamlin, who restarted fourth, made Rogers look like a wizard, arcing high in turn one with 10 laps left to grab third, and getting Edwards off turn four on the same lap for second.
With nine laps remaining in the scheduled 250-lap event, Hamlin powered his No. 20 Z-Line Designs Toyota Camry to the inside and passed Harvick for the lead. Despite waiting through another caution for Bryan Clauson’s spin, Hamlin calmly drove away for the victory under the green-white-checkered format.
“This means more to me to win at Richmond than any trophy I could ever have,” Hamlin said. “I can hear the fans here, even over all the noise here in victory lane, and that means a lot to me.”
It was Hamlin’s sixth career NASCAR Nationwide Series victory and his first here at Richmond. The victory was also Toyota’s fifth- straight NNS victory and seventh in 11 races so far this season.
Edwards led 126 laps and Harvick paced 98, as they had the two best cars all night. It just didn’t work out for either of them. Harvick held on to finish second, followed by Hamlin’s Toyota teammate Kyle Busch, David Ragan and Steven Wallace. Edwards was sixth at the end.
Harvick said he was darned if he did and darned if he didn’t.
“Fifteen laps to go, what do you do?,” he asked. “I’ve been caught on both sides of that, but it only cost us one spot. I was pitting, until I saw the 60 (Edwards) and the 1 (Bliss) behind him stay up. I figured more cars would stay out.”
Edwards was pragmatic about it.
“Harvick and I were up there leading and we just didn’t pit and everybody else did,” Edwards said. “That was it. But they had like 10 cars between us and the guy behind us, so they all got time to think about what they were gonna do. By watching the leaders stay out, it’s an easy decision then. I should have pitted. It’s just a mistake.”
For Rogers, it was his third-straight victory, with three different drivers, in the Nationwide Series. Asked what he was doing up on the box that had led to such success, Rogers cracked, “Asking for a raise.”
It was a rough night for Busch, who fell down a lap in the early going and needed the free pass on lap 146 to get back in it.
He got back in the top 10 at lap 200, and was sixth and closing on lap 218 when Derrike Cope triggered an accident on the front stretch. That caution set up Hamlin’s victory.
Busch restarted sixth and gained one spot on lap 234 when another caution waved for Ryan Hackett’s spin on the frontstretch.
He pitted with Hamlin and the two leap-frogged the cars on older tires to the finish.
Busch might have gotten second had he not been hit by the onrushing Wallace off turn two on the final lap. Wallace got Busch sideways, but the youngster saved it and got back in it, chasing Wallace up the track and out of third place.
“He’s a boy playing in a man’s sport, and I don’t have to play those kinds of games,” a clearly vexed Busch said of Wallace after the race. “If he wants to play like that, then we’ll do that.”
Busch walked back to Wallace’s car after the race was over, leaned into the car to talk to Wallace and had Wallace grab his helmet. “I told him that if he messes with the bull, he’s gonna get the horns,” Busch said.
Edwards gained on point-leader Clint Bowyer, trailing by just nine points heading to Darlington. Busch, winner of three races so far this season, is 21 points back.