Emotions Run High as Denny Hamlin Hits 60th Career Win in Sin City

The tears were flowing for Denny Hamlin, who finally checked off his milestone 60th career NASCAR Cup Series win, a mark he's had on his radar all season, in Sunday's South Point 400.

The reasons for the emotions shown by the usually stoic Hamlin were plentiful. A combination of the health status of his father, Dennis, the impact of the win milestone itself, which ties him with Kevin Harvick for 10th all-time, and the fact that he advanced to the Championship 4 by virtue of the win, led to a lot of things rushing through Hamlin's mind in the immediate aftermath of a hard-fought win at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

Race Results: South Point 400 at Las Vegas

Playoff Grid: NASCAR Cup Series Playoff Standings

Hamlin was so emotional, he even put aside his longstanding rivalry with the fans who attend NASCAR races in his victory interview.

"Yeah, it definitely means a lot. This is the point where I kind of give the fans some shit, but not today," Hamlin said. "I appreciate all of you so much."

As the tears rolled out of his eyes, Hamlin continued, "Yeah, obviously want to say hi to my dad, family back at home. All the friends that came out here for Vegas, hoping we get 60. I didn't think we were. Put the pedal down the last 10 laps, made it happen."

Hamlin, who only had one prior win at Las Vegas Motor Speedway throughout his 20-year NASCAR Cup Series career, made it happen, alright. And due to the timing, he'll now fight for a championship, something that has proved to be quite elusive for the Virginia racing product.

Hamlin, who took the lead for the final time with four laps to go, led a total of nine laps on the day, and while his No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota was good, he never really looked like he had the car to win the race. Until the very final run of the race. Hamlin credited his crew chief, Chris Gayle, for never giving up and giving him the best adjustments of the day at the end of the race.

"Truth, Chris did an amazing job on that final stop, getting the car just right," Hamlin explained when asked how he pulled off the win. "I just held it down. That's all I could do, is just go for it. I felt like I had nothing to lose. Just go for it, try to punch a ticket now. Man, this one feels great."

Hamlin made the race-winning pass on Chase Briscoe, his Joe Gibbs Racing teammate who was on two tires due to a late-race pit strategy, but the win was set up for Hamlin in a hard-fought battle against Kyle Larson for the runner-up spot prior to him getting around Briscoe.

It was apparent, whoever prevailed in the battle between Hamlin and Larson would likely go on to win the race, and that was the case as Hamlin held off Larson by 1.533 seconds for the race win.

While Larson had a great car on the long run, he conceded that the Toyota teams had much more short-run speed, and in the end, that's what it came down to in the closing laps of the South Point 400.

"I thought I had a big enough gap down the backstretch to go to the top, get momentum. His car, the Toyotas in general, were really, really, really fast on a short run, had a lot of speed. He must have nailed the bottom behind me, got inside. It was over from there," Larson explained. "Yeah, [Hamlin] did an awesome job. He got up on the wheel there. I felt like I was up on the wheel. He did a really good job."

Christopher Bell ended the day with a solid third-place finish, but he once again came up just shy of his first career win at the 1.5-mile Las Vegas Motor Speedway, and Briscoe would fade to fourth, but did a masterful job of managing his two tires to bring home a top-five finish.

"I was hanging on," Briscoe said after the race. "Yeah, I thought I was in a really good spot there, the first three or four laps after the restart, my car drove really good. As I ran, I was just absolutely sideways in our Bass Pro Shops Toyota. I thought there for a while when they were racing hard enough, maybe I was going to sneak one off on them.

"Just really loose at the end. Glad at least a JGR car won. That's going to sting for a while."

Tyler Reddick, who finished fifth, was the highest non-Playoff driver in the final finishing order, and he was followed to the line by Playoff contender Joey Logano, who pulled the same two-tire strategy at the end of the race as Briscoe, and as a result, he was able to record a solid finish.

Alex Bowman, Kyle Busch, Ryan Preece, and Brad Keselowski rounded out the top-10 finishers.

Three Playoff contenders finished outside of the top-10 on Sunday; the highest-finishing of those drivers was Chase Elliott, who suffered some damage in a multi-car late-race crash on Lap 245. Elliott would fortunately finish the race, albeit in the 18th position.

Elliott had an uncontrolled tire penalty on pit road in the second Stage, which put him a lap down, but he was able to get the free pass at the end of Stage 2, which put him back in the game. Unfortunately, the late-race incident hampered any shot he had at a solid day.

William Byron took the win in Stage 1, and finished third in Stage 2, and as Sunday's race was drawing to a close, he had the lead. However, on Lap 231, Byron experienced a wiggle and nearly crashed his No. 24 car into the outside wall. While he was able to save it, he lost the lead to Larson, and a few laps later, Byron would slam directly into the rear of Ty Dillon's slowing car, as Dillon was attempting to come to pit road, something Byron was unaware of.

Here is the terrifying onboard camera of William Byron, who had no idea that Ty Dillon ahead of him was coming to pit road. Massive impact. pic.twitter.com/aaOFieGHQS
— Toby Christie (@Toby_Christie) October 13, 2025

What resulted was a massive and scary impact, from which both drivers were able to walk away. But Byron's No. 24 car was done for the day, and he finished in the 36th position.

Ryan Blaney was the other Playoff contender who suffered trouble. His issues came on Lap 72 of Sunday's race, as he cut a left front tire, which sent him hard into the outside wall in Turn 4. The damage he sustained was too much to continue, and he would go on to be credited with a 38th (last) place finish.

Here is the incident, triggered by a cut left front tire, which sent Ryan Blaney into the outside wall, and has led to catastrophic damage and will result in a 38th-place finish for the #NASCAR Cup Series Playoff contender. pic.twitter.com/xnb0LIvMWW
— Toby Christie (@Toby_Christie) October 12, 2025

As a result of the rough outings, Byron, Elliott, and Blaney join Joey Logano, who came into the race as the last driver in the Playoff Grid, behind the cutline with two races remaining in the Round of 8 of the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs.

Byron sits 15 points below the cutline, while Elliott sits 23 markers out, Logano is 24 points back, and Blaney finds himself in a near must-win situation at 31 points below the cutline.

Next up for the NASCAR Cup Series is the YellaWood 500 at Talladega Superspeedway on Sunday, October 19. That race will be televised on NBC, and coverage will kick off at 2:00 PM ET. The Motor Racing Network (MRN) and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio will provide the radio broadcast of that event.

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