Joe Gibbs Racing’s No. 11 driver Denny Hamlin made his SRX debut at Stafford as he won the rain-shortened race.
The NASCAR driver was competing against the likes of former and current Cup drivers Clint Bowyer, Brad Keselowski, Kevin Harvick and Ryan Newman. He got the better of all of them as he won the race on his debut. The race was shortened from 75 laps to 58 due to rain.
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Having achieved a 100-success race as it is just his first race, Hamlin joked that he would retire with this record. He tweeted:
“1 for 1. Think I’ll retire. Thanks, SRX Racing and Stafford Speedway.”
1 for 1. Think I’ll retire. Thanks @SRXracing & @StaffordSpeedwy pic.twitter.com/uWvVCQO1xI
— Denny Hamlin (@dennyhamlin) July 14, 2023
The 42-year-old driver was already looking to drive for the series last year but having done it a year later, he said that he had a lot of fun racing in a different discipline to NASCAR.
“You know, this is a lot of fun. From a driver’s standpoint, knowing that you’re in the same equipment as everyone else, they don’t let you do any changes to these cars that not every car has. It really puts an emphasis — I mean, there’s no spotters or anything, a lot of the contact you saw is that we just couldn’t see the people around us.
“Man, this was so much fun. Short track racing, this is the grassroots racing that we hope to showcase.”
Hamlin used to drive late models at local short tracks before his NASCAR career. This event was the first time though that he was racing at Stafford.
While there is no news as to whether Hamlin will return to the series, Hamlin is certainly not thinking about retiring from the series given the fun he had.