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Denny Hamlin Sprint Cup chances

NASCAR Chase For The Cup: Hamlin Looks For A Surge At Martinsville

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Denny Hamlin and Jimmie Johnson each have a record of success at the Martinsville Speedway in Virginia and they both—especially Hamlin—need to marshal all the good things they’ve done in years past as they try and catch leader Brad Keselowski when the NASCAR Chase For The Cup resumes on Sunday afternoonwith the running of the Tums Fast Relief 500 (1 PM ET, ESPN).

There are four races left, and Hamlin is still 20 points behind leader Brad Keselowski. Barring something seismic, that puts him at least three weeks of finishing solidly ahead of the leader to pull even. Hamlin won both races held at this track in 2010, and one of two in both 2008 and 2009.

Johnson is in much better position, at seven points back, but that could potentially take two weeks to wipe out and JJ certainly can’t afford to fall any further behind. He won twice here in 2007, and joined Hamlin in winning one race at Martinsville in 2008-09.

My brother Bill normally provides TheSportsNotebook with insights on how the track functions, but he’s in Calgary. The story is he’s doing a long-haul trucking run to lead him out of cell-phone range. I actually think he’s up there trying to track down the Yeti, the snow-covered villain in an old Scooby-Doo episode. But I digress.

Martinsville had a race in the early spring, won by Ryan Newman, and what Bill told us then was that this was the shortest track on the circuit, creating a tight environment for racing. The consequences of this are that pole position is very significant, due to the difficulty in passing. And on a more mischievous level, it’s a “revenge track.” The close proximity of the drivers mean if you’ve got to an axe to grind, you can do some bumping and it’s tougher to detect.

It’s also tough to detect any way Hamlin can seriously close the gap on the leader without a significant dent in the points gap on Sunday. We’re already down to just three drivers with a shot at the Cup. It could be two by Sunday night in Martinsville.

NASCAR Chase For The Cup: A Tighter Race Goes To Kansas

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If recent history at the Kansas Speedway is any guide, we should see some type of significant movement in the NASCAR Chase For The Cup. The track that hosts Sunday’s Hollywood Casino 400 (1 PM ET, ESPN) has seen recent winners that include all the current leaders and a few of the longshot contenders.

Brad Keselowski, who won one of the two races run here in 2011, is still the leader with five races to go, but his lead was cut in half by Jimmie Johnson, who now trails him by just seven points. Denny Hamlin moved to within fifteen points—still a ways to go, but he’s got a puncher’s chance. And Clint Bowyer, who won last week in Charlotte is still close enough to dream of a miracle finish at 23 points out.

“It came down to a fuel mileage race,” said TheSportsNotebook’s NASCAR consultant, my brother Bill. He went on to explain that this is a race where the drivers aren’t in position to make pit stops and victory ends up going to he who manages his remaining fuel better. Keselowski didn’t and allowed other drivers back into the championship picture.

Sunday’s race may come down to something similar. “It should be a fast track,” Bill told TheSportsNotebook. “But it’s a cookie-cutter, so there’s not a lot of unique characteristics.” The bland structure of the track doesn’t lend itself to anything crazy happening, but as we saw last week in Charlotte, that’s not necessary to tighten things up.

Hamlin won an April race held at this same venue and a win on Sunday puts him right back near the top. Johnson joined Keselowski in winning in ’11. Other outlying contenders who have won here in the last five years include Greg Biffle and Tony Stewart, though each would need almost everything to go right for five straight weeks to even have a shot.

But we’ve got a tighter Chase For The Cup than we did a week ago. When the drivers arrived in Charlotte, Johnson was the only one in shouting distance of Keselowski . Now JJ is close, and Hamlin’s moved to shouting distance. We’ll see which driver can recapture their previous winning form at the Kansas Speedway on Sunday.