RICHMOND, Va. -- Denny Hamlin returned from last week's injury-shortened weekend and led almost from start to finish Friday night to win the NASCAR Xfinity Series race at Richmond International Raceway.
Hamlin led the first 154 laps after starting on the pole. He relinquished the lead for one lap to Brian Scott during a series of green-flag pit stops, and to Elliott Sadler during another green flag stop late in the race, but both times regained the lead on the following lap. The Virginia driver routinely built leads of several seconds on the 0.75-mile oval and won by 3.719 seconds.
The victory is Hamlin's 12th in the series and third at Richmond. Following up on Kyle Busch's wire-to-wire victory for Joe Gibbs Racing in the series last September, the JGR teams have led 498 of the last 500 laps run in the series at RIR.
The victory also capped a remarkable return for Hamlin, who started the race last weekend, then turned the car over to NASCAR novice Erik Jones during a rain-delay because he was complaining of neck and back pain. He pronounced himself "100 percent" at the track just 15 miles from where he grew up, and qualified second for tonight's Sprint Cup race.
The race also was the second dominant performance in the series in a row, Joey Logano having led wire-to-wire last weekend at Bristol Motor Speedway.
"I know what it feels like to be on the other side of the butt-whooping now," Logano joked afterward. He started second and ran in the top five all night, but said "We were just a second-place car. Straight up, that's where we were. I couldn't catch him."
Regan Smith finished third, followed by Jones and Chase Elliott.
Sports on 04/25/2015