Brooklyn, MI (June 8, 2025) — Ultimately Denny Hamlin’s No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota had just enough fuel to claim the checkered flag at Michigan International Speedway and do one celebratory series of burnouts in front of the huge grandstand crowd before running out of gas on his encore celebration and needing a tow to his ultimate destination: Victory Lane.
The 44-year-old put on a master class in fuel saving and end-of-race pressure at the two-mile oval - taking his third win of the season and 57th of his career. Hamlin crossed the line 1.099-second ahead of Roush Fenway Keselowski Racing’s Chris Buescher and his JGR teammate, Ty Gibbs, after the day’s most dominant driver, Hendrick Motorsports’ William Byron had to pit for fuel on the last lap.
“No, not really,’’ Hamlin said, insisting he wasn’t overly worried about running out of fuel in the closing laps. “I wanted to get the lead and obviously he [William Byron] was doing a really good job defending.
With 20 laps remaining, Hamlin had made his way from 11th place to fifth in the running order, behind the day’s most dominant cars - Carson Hocevar in the No. 77 Spire Motorsports Chevrolet and Byron in the No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet.
Both Hocevar, a Michigan native racing for his first career NASCAR Cup Series win, and Byron were told by their crew chiefs they were going to run out of fuel before the end of the race. Instead of a fuel issue however, Hocevar, who led 32 laps, had to pit from the race lead with 19 laps remaining for a flat tire.
Byron, who led a race best 98 of the 200 laps, inherited the lead from Hocevar and then had to try to fend off Hamlin - who methodically started moving forward - racing Byron hard and forcing the championship leader out of any sort of fuel-save mode.
Hamlin got by Byron with four laps to go and Byron dove down pit road for fuel on the final lap, having to settle for a 28th place finish. Hocevar finished 29th.
Bubba Wallace drove the No. 23 23XI Racing Toyota – a team Hamlin co-owns – to fourth place. Hendrick Motorsports’ Kyle Larson was fifth.
There were 13 lead changes among 11 drivers and Hamlin led only five laps on the day.
With 11 races remaining in the regular season, Byron holds a 41-point lead over Larson in the championship points standings. There have been nine race winners. Team Penske’s Austin Cindric currently holds the 16th and final spot in the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs point standings.
The NASCAR Cup Series will make its first international points-paying trip next weekend with Sunday’s Viva Mexico 250 at Mexico City’s renowned Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez road course (3 p.m. ET, Amazon Prime, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, MAX).