Is It Time For Denny Hamlin To Deliver Back-To-Back Wins?

After a whirlwind offseason filled with lawsuits, family tragedy, and injury, Denny Hamlin admittedly was unable to give his full attention to preparing for the 2026 NASCAR Cup Series season, and the veteran racer fully expected to fire out of the gates a little slower than usual this season.

Despite those expectations, it only took Hamlin five races into the campaign to score his first win of the season, bringing his career total to 61 wins, in last Sunday's Pennzoil 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

Hamlin is back, and this week, the NASCAR Cup Series heads back to a track that is among his best on the circuit, the 1.366-mile Darlington Raceway. Could Hamlin rack up back-to-back wins this weekend?

It's very possible, as he now has momentum on his side.

"It's great to win early," Hamlin said after last weekend's race at Las Vegas. "It gives us some momentum. But realistically, I look from last week to the next six weeks, Okay, we got a bazillion wins at all these racetracks. In this group of races I expect to win multiple. If we don't, that's where I get concerned."

Additionally, Darlington Raceway is a track that Hamlin has reached paydirt at five times in the past, including last spring, and this weekend, it's expected that tire wear will play a larger factor than last season, with a horsepower increase to 750 HP this weekend.

Hamlin, one of the best in the series at Darlington, is one of the best at tire conservation in the sport, as well. It feels like the planets are aligning for Hamlin to add a sixth Darlington Raceway trophy to his mantle.

And if Hamlin can score the win this weekend, it'll draw him to within one victory of Kyle Busch's career total of 63 wins, which is the ninth-most in the history of the NASCAR Cup Series.

However, if Hamlin is to score his second consecutive spring Darlington Raceway victory to extend his winning streak to two consecutive races, he'll likely have to fend off some other really talented drivers at the treacherous egg-shaped facility.

If Hamlin Doesn't Score the Darlington Win, Who Could?

Among the drivers expected to push Hamlin for the win in Sunday's Goodyear 400 are Chase Briscoe, William Byron, and Erik Jones.

While Briscoe, Hamlin's teammate at Joe Gibbs Racing, has never won the spring race at Darlington, the driver has scored the win in the last two editions of the Southern 500 at the track. In last year's Southern 500, Briscoe churned out an excessively dominant effort, as he led 309 laps on his path to victory.

After the start to the season Briscoe has had, where he's recorded three finishes of 36th-or-worse, a win would be some much-needed medicine for the Indiana native.

For Byron, if he's able to come out on top this weekend, it'll be sweet vengeance for a missed opportunity last spring at Darlington Raceway. Byron, who started from the pole position in this event a year ago, led the opening 243 laps of the event, which, according to Racing Insights, is the sixth-most laps led consecutively to start a race in the modern era of the NASCAR Cup Series.

However, after he lost the lead on Lap 244 to Hamlin, Byron was never able to get back to the lead, and he'd end up crossing the line as the race's first loser in the second position by more than a half-second behind Hamlin.

Byron, who won the 2023 spring race at Darlington, was also in position to win this event in 2022, until he was punted from the lead in the closing laps by Joey Logano, who would go on to win the race. Don't sleep on Byron and his crew chief Rudy Fugle who have proven they have what it takes to contend at Darlington.

And while Erik Jones isn't usually on the list of drivers you expect to score a win going into most race weekends, Darlington Raceway is different. Of Jones' three career NASCAR Cup Series wins, two of them have come at the 1.366-mile track, albeit in the Southern 500.

That being said, Jones has six top-five finishes, and nine top-10s in 16 career starts at Darlington, and he sports a career average finish of 12.8 at Darlington Raceway, his second-best average finish at any track currently on the NASCAR Cup Series schedule.

This is a huge opportunity for Jones and the No. 43 LEGACY MOTOR CLUB team to break through this weekend.

If nobody is able to stop Hamlin from going back-to-back, naturally, attention will turn to whether Hamlin could score three consecutive wins, as the NASCAR Cup Series will head to the 0.526-mile Martinsville Speedway, where Hamlin also won last spring.

However, Hamlin has this weekend's race to take care of before we can even begin to wonder if he can match Tyler Reddick's mark of three consecutive wins from earlier this year.