This article is part of our NASCAR Barometer series.
A combination of speed on track and on pit road gave Denny Hamlin the track position he needed to win Sunday at Dover Motor Speedway. Hamlin qualified inside the top 10 and never put a foot wrong throughout the race's 400 laps, taking advantage of every opportunity to claw his way forward and into the lead. That effort put him in position to lead the final 72 laps of the afternoon, holding off Kyle Larson by taking away the chaser's preferred line despite the Hendrick Motorsports rival closing to within passing distance. In all, it was a vintage outing from Hamlin, who joins William Byron atop the season's win total with three victories each.
The No. 11 team will be licking their chops for more this week as the battle continues at Kansas Speedway where Hamlin is the defending winner. Toyota drivers have won five of the last six Kansas races, including the last four straight. Ford will be the brand seeking an upset. The manufacturer has been shut out of Victory Lane in 2024 while Chevrolet and Toyota have swallowed up all the victories so far. After Dover's success, the No. 11 Toyota is likely to be the one to beat again, though. Hamlin has not finished outside of the top five at the 1.5-mile oval in the last five races.
UPGRADE
Denny Hamlin - Sunday was a great afternoon for Hamlin. He started inside the top 10 and went on to score stage points in both segments before taking command of the race and holding off Kyle Larson to the checkered flag for the win. The race was one of track position, which Hamlin used to his advantage throughout. He spent nearly the entire day running inside the top 10, and quick pit work enabled him to get out ahead of some of his closest competition, too. It was Hamlin's third race victory of the season and second at Dover. The victory ties him with William Byron for most of the season so far as the seesaw battle between the pair continues to smolder. Hamlin is also a four-time winner at Kansas. He won there last spring and backed that up with a second-place finish in the fall return. He hasn't finished outside of the top five at the track in the last five races.
Martin Truex Jr. - Truex scored his fifth Dover stage win to get the afternoon off on the right foot in Sunday's Wurth 400. That could have been a signal of how strong he was that afternoon, but things got more difficult when contact damaged the front of his car. Truex and team persevered but their early-race speed evaporated with the damage to the splitter and hood. Such problems would have severely disrupted the car's handling, causing most to fall behind throughout the afternoon. Despite the added burden, Truex marched his car back to the front of the field, capturing a third-place finish, though. It was an impressive comeback that netted Truex his third top-five finish of the season so far. The quest for a victory continues, though. Truex is a two-time winner at Kansas, and he led 103 combined laps in the last three races at the track but crashed out last fall to finish 36th.
Kyle Larson - Despite a lowly 21st-place starting position, Larson drove to the front of the field from his 21stand captured his sixth stage victory of the season in the second segment of Sunday's stop at Dover. In fact, he marched through the field so quickly that he finished fifth in the first stage, too. The quick work he made of the field should make fans wonder what would have been possible had qualifying turned out better for him. In the end, track position was the biggest determinant of success and Larson didn't have it in the final laps despite chasing down Hamlin to be within striking distance of the lead in the final laps. His quest for another 2024 win continues. Larson won from pole at Kansas in the fall of 2021 and hasn't failed to finish in the top 10 there since. He led 184 combined laps at the track last season to finish second and fourth, and he started on the front row in both of those races.
Kyle Busch - Sunday's fourth-place finish was Busch's first since Atlanta in February. The result was also the former champion's second top-10 in the last three races. Results like Dover's suggest he may be putting his early season struggles in the rearview mirror. Prior to Texas, Busch scored just one top-10 finish in the six straight races after that Atlanta top-five. With the turnaround, Busch could be looking at more top-10s and further consolidation of a spot among the top 16 playoff contenders. Continuing to finish in the top five will also put him in position to grab a race win, too. There has been no shortage of problems for the No. 8 team but progress is starting to take hold. Kansas should be a spot Busch can continue that turnaround, too. He has two prior track wins and finished seventh there late last season.
Noah Gragson - The positive momentum Gragson started at Talladega carried right through the Dover weekend. He started the weekend with an impressive top-five in qualifying, which he extended through Sunday's race to a sixth-place finish. Adding stage points to the top-10 result would have made the day even better for him, but he still walked away with his fourth top-10 of the season and second in a row. Gragson now sits 21st in the championship standings but still 80 points behind the playoff positions. That points deficit will be difficult to overcome without consistently scoring stage points, but continuing to run inside the top 10 shows promise for the No. 10 squad as the season ages. The coming week's race at Kansas will be a true test, though. In three series starts, Gragson's best result was a pair of 18th-place finishes. He did win there in 2022 in Xfinity Series equipment, though.
DOWNGRADE
Brad Keselowski - Keselowski's run of good form came to a halt Sunday at Dover when he brought out the caution at the end of the first stage. A rear tire failure cause him to spin at the very end of the segment, but he did well to avoid any contact and getting the car to pit road for service. That effort only delayed the pain, though. In the second stage, he drifted up into the outside wall and then limped back to pit road for repairs. After spending the rest of the afternoon limping around with a damaged vehicle, Keselowski finished 17 laps behind the leaders in 30th position. He now sits 18th in the standings, two points away from teammate Chris Buescher in the last of the playoff positions. Keselowski has two Kansas victories, and he led 23 laps there last fall on his way to a ninth-place finish, which was one of 14 career Kansas top-10s from 28 starts.
William Byron - After starting third and scoring a runner-up finish in the first stage, Byron slipped backward and was caught up in a multi-car crash with less than 100 laps remaining in the race. The accident happened in front of the No. 24 and Byron was left with no way to avoid the cars sliding across the track. The damage to the car was severe and forced Byron to retire for his first DNF of the season. While outcomes like Sunday's are not preferable, they don't impact Byron's playoff prospects. It is still early in the season and the No. 24 is assured of a playoff spot, but they will need to be careful to avoid Sunday's trouble turning into a trend. Byron has never won at Kansas, but he also hasn't finished lower than 16th at the track since 2019. He started on pole and finished third in last season's spring race and then was 15th in the fall.
Christopher Bell - Another DNF Sunday at Dover left Bell with his third finish outside of the top 30 in the four most recent races. Like Byron, Bell was collected in the multi-car crash late Sunday, which forced his fifth finish worse than 30th of the season. While his playoff position is secured through his Phoenix victory, a long string of bad results is not a good place to be. Unlike Byron, the No. 20 team has been bitten more frequently with poor results. The team will need to figure out how to bring back consistent top-10 finishes, avoiding the on-track trouble that leads to bad results. That means getting positive track position early, avoiding mistakes, and staying there to the finish. The good news is that Bell still tends to show competitive speed most weekends. Kansas could be a good place for that to start, too. Bell scored four top-10 finishes and started from pole twice in his last five starts.
Bubba Wallace - Wallace's playoff push took another blow Sunday at Dover when he was tagged from behind and crashed out of the race in the final stage. It was Wallace's second DNF in as many weeks and keeps him outside of the top 16 in the standings. Heading to Kansas, he sits two points behind Chris Buescher and the playoff spots. Prior to the two-race slump, Wallace was on a run of four consecutive top-15 finishes. Without a win, those are the types of results Wallace needs a quick return to. Continuing to fall behind in the points will make the run through the summer and up to the playoffs much more treacherous. Kansas should be a spot he can turn around the slide, though. Wallace won there in the fall of 2022 and finished fourth in the spring race last season. He has led laps in each of his last three starts at the track, but will need to work to avoid a third consecutive DNF this weekend.
BIGGEST SURPRISE
Daniel Hemric - Sometimes you just need to be in the right place at the right time. Good fortune fell upon Hemric late at Dover when the caution came out as the field was cycling through green-flag pit stops. Since Hemric was pitting at the end of the window, he was one of just a few cars left on track when the caution waved, leaving him in the lead despite having slipped outside of the top 20 earlier in the race. The team effectively got a free pit stop, just losing some track position but remaining inside the top 10. From there, given the track position nature of the proceedings, all Hemric had to do was maintain position from there. He did, and that gave him his second ninth-place finish in as many races. Fantasy players shouldn't expect that to occur every week, though. At Kansas, Hemric has two Cup Series starts from 2019. He started on pole in the second of those but tallied a best finish of just 18th.
