Denny Hamlin scored Toyota's first ever NASCAR Sprint Cup Series win on Thursday at Daytona, winning the second Gatorade Duel qualifying race for next Sunday's season-opener.
Hamlin and his Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Tony Stewart worked together to beat Jeff Gordon in the closing laps, securing the first major success for Toyota in NASCAR's top series and putting three Camrys in the first three rows of the grid for Sunday's race.
Stewart led on the last restart into a green-white-chequer finish until Denny Hamlin overtook him, getting a push from Gordon. The Hendrick driver then tried to go for victory but Stewart lined up behind Hamlin to push him and secure a Toyota one-two.
"We needed to kind of almost exchange positions to kind of get that finish we needed at the end, because we knew the 24 (Gordon), the 8 (Mark Martin) and the 9 (Kasey Kahne) were all planning something behind us," Hamlin said.
"I'm very proud. I definitely was a guy that liked to switch over to Toyota. We knew they had a lot of resources that we were not able to do with the 400 or so employees that we have at Joe Gibbs Racing. It's finally starting to pay off."
Pos Driver Make Laps
1. Denny Hamlin Toyota 64
2. Tony Stewart Toyota 64
3. Jeff Gordon Chevrolet 64
4. Kasey Kahne Dodge 64
5. Mark Martin Chevrolet 64
6. David Ragan Ford 64
7. Kevin Harvick Chevrolet 64
8. Greg Biffle Ford 64
9. Dale Jarrett Toyota 64
10. John Andretti Chevrolet 64
11. Kyle Busch Toyota 64
12. David Reutimann Toyota 64
13. Michael Waltrip Toyota 64
14. Robby Gordon Dodge 64
15. Matt Kenseth Ford 64
16. Travis Kvapil Ford 64
17. David Gilliland Ford 64
18. Ken Schrader Dodge 64
19. Patrick Carpentier Dodge 57
20. Eric McClure Chevrolet 43
21. Dave Blaney Toyota 24
22. Jeff Burton Chevrolet 16
23. Jacques Villeneuve Toyota 14
24. Jamie McMurray Ford 14
25. Dario Franchitti Dodge 14
26. Stanton Barrett Chevrolet 14
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