After posting the fastest lap in Saturday’s qualifying session at Michigan International Speedway and securing the 50th Busch Light Pole Award of his NASCAR Cup Series career, Denny Hamlin will start Sunday’s FireKeepers Casino 400 from the rear after his team was forced to make repairs to the No. 11 Toyota following damage sustained during a flat Goodyear tire in practice after qualifying.

June 6, 2026 

Toyota’s dominance in the 2026 NASCAR Cup Series rolled on Saturday at Michigan International Speedway, where Denny Hamlin delivered a clutch performance to claim the Busch Light Pole Award for Sunday’s FireKeepers Casino 400.

–by Mark Cipolloni–

The 45-year-old veteran wheeled the No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota to a blistering lap of 195.117 mph, edging out Michigan native Carson Hocevar by a razor-thin 0.018 seconds and denying the young Spire Motorsports driver a storybook front-row start on his home track.

Hamlin’s milestone 50th career Cup Series pole came under dramatic circumstances. Just an hour earlier in practice, his Toyota suffered a tire issue that sidelined him for much of the session while his crew worked feverishly on repairs. Despite the setback, Hamlin rolled out in the final round and found the perfect balance, calling the lap “the limit for sure.”

After climbing from his car, Hamlin walked straight over to a visibly disappointed Hocevar on pit road. The two shared a quick conversation and a hug, with Hamlin holding up a nearly-touching thumb and forefinger while joking about how “bad” he felt for spoiling the local hero’s moment.

“They did a great job accounting for the damage on the bottom side,” Hamlin said of his crew. “They rebalanced it, but it was a handful—all I wanted, certainly. That was surprising.”

Hocevar, who earlier led the most laps in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race before finishing third, couldn’t hide his emotions but stayed optimistic about race day.

“Yeah, I would have loved to have that there,” Hocevar said, “but third in the truck race and second in Cup qualifying—hopefully that’s a trend there. I feel like it’s a really good race car, one of the best I’ve had here. So I hope it translates tomorrow.”

Strong Toyota Showing Across the Board

Reigning championship leader Tyler Reddick (No. 45 23XI Racing Toyota), who had topped practice, qualified third. Hamlin’s Joe Gibbs Racing teammates Ty Gibbs and Chase Briscoe rounded out the top five, giving Toyota four of the top-five starting spots.

Chase Elliott led the Chevrolet contingent in sixth, while Chris Buescher was the top Ford in 14th. Notably, the last driver to win the Michigan Cup race from pole was Joey Logano in 2019; Logano will start 18th on Sunday.

With Hamlin starting from the point and a fast Toyota contingent locked in upfront, Sunday’s FireKeepers Casino 400 promises high-stakes action on one of NASCAR’s fastest and most competitive tracks.

NASCAR Cup Series Qualifying – FireKeepers Casino 400

Pos
No.
Driver
Team
Time
Speed

1
11
Denny Hamlin
National Debt Relief Toyota
36.901
195.117

2
77
Carson Hocevar
Zeigler Auto Group Chevrolet
36.919
195.022

3
45
Tyler Reddick
ROCKSTAR ENERGY DRINK Toyota
36.929
194.969

4
54
Ty Gibbs
Monster Energy Toyota
36.953
194.842

5
19
Chase Briscoe
Bass Pro Shops Toyota
36.956
194.826

6
9
Chase Elliott
NAPA Auto Parts Chevrolet
36.958
194.816

7
5
Kyle Larson
HendrickCars.com Chevrolet
36.967
194.768

8
20
Christopher Bell
Rheem Toyota
37.003
194.579

9
24
William Byron
Axalta Solar Boost Chevrolet
37.038
194.395

10
43
Erik Jones
Dollar Tree Toyota
37.090
194.122

11
7
Daniel Suarez
NationsGuard Chevrolet
37.121
193.960

12
35
Riley Herbst
Monster Energy Zero Sugar Toyota
37.127
193.929

13
23
Bubba Wallace
Columbia Toyota
37.133
193.898

14
17
Chris Buescher
Kroger/Oscar Mayer/The Rustik Oven Ford
37.186
193.621

15
41
Cole Custer
Air Lift Chevrolet
37.205
193.522

16
38
Zane Smith
Aaron’s Rent To Own Ford
37.213
193.481

17
42
John Hunter Nemechek
Pye-Barker Fire & Safety Toyota
37.240
193.340

18
22
Joey Logano
Autotrader Ford
37.257
193.252

19
12
Ryan Blaney
Menards/Richmond Water Heaters Ford
37.258
193.247

20
71
Michael McDowell
Garner Trucking Chevrolet
37.277
193.149

21
3
Austin Dillon
Dow Mobility Services Chevrolet
37.277
193.149

22
4
Noah Gragson
Ribbiot Ford
37.341
192.818

23
47
Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
Pylon Aviation Chevrolet
37.342
192.812

24
10
Ty Dillon
Patriot Mobile Chevrolet
37.408
192.472

25
16
AJ Allmendinger
Grizzly Nicotine Pouches Chevrolet
37.457
192.220

26
6
Brad Keselowski
Solomon Plumbing Ford
37.476
192.123

27
60
Ryan Preece
BuildSubmarines.com Ford
37.551
191.739

28
33
Austin Hill(i)
Rebel Bourbon Chevrolet
37.553
191.729

29
48
Alex Bowman
Ally Chevrolet
37.561
191.688

30
97
Shane Van Gisbergen
SafetyCulture Chevrolet
37.562
191.683

31
2
Austin Cindric
Discount Tire Ford
37.667
191.149

32
1
Ross Chastain
Busch Light Chevrolet
37.690
191.032

33
51
Cody Ware
Super.com Chevrolet
37.715
190.905

34
88
Connor Zilisch #
WeatherTech Chevrolet
37.720
190.880

35
34
Todd Gilliland
Love’s Travel Stops Ford
37.730
190.830

36
44
JJ Yeley(i)
Fanatics Casino Chevrolet
38.570
186.674

37
21
Josh Berry
Motorcraft/Quick Lane Ford
0.000
0.000

 

DENNY HAMLIN, No. 11 National Debt Relief Toyota Camry XSE, Joe Gibbs Racing

Can you talk about what it means to you to earn your 50th career pole? 

“Yeah, it feels good. It was certainly a little unexpected, considering the adversity we had during practice and knowing that my car wasn’t going to be quite optimized to where we expected it to be. Over the last few weeks with the rain outs, I thought that it was kind of taking away opportunities for us to get to the 50. I knew that the next one was that milestone. Glad we were able to get it done and certainly, get that number one pit stall and just kind of see where things go. We’re going to have to come from the back tomorrow and that’s going to be a challenge in itself. Certainly, this racetrack with the long green flag runs that you get. We’re going to have to have good restarts and we’re going to have to have the race play out just right.”

Did you ever think you would be in position to tie Ryan Newman with a number of poles?

“No, I mean, took me probably more starts to do it? (laughter) A little bit longer career there, so that certainly is an advantage, I think, a longer career. I’m not really sure, but, no, not really. I mean, he was the king of qualifying for such a long time. So, I didn’t know that he’s kind of next up on the list and certainly would be awesome to just keep it going. At least lets me know I can get some one lap speed out of the car anyway.”

How did the flat tire effect the underbody? 

“Yeah, I was just trying to see how much we drug off. I’m trying to eyeball it. They got much better instruments to be able to tell, but I could visually see that mine had drug in spots that – everyone kind of drags, when you go in practice, you drag a little bit, but then I saw that mine was significant compared to cars that hadn’t had a flat, so I knew that that was not good. I basically shrug my shoulders to say, there’s nothing we can do about it. It’s screwed.”

Do you feel like you can work your way through the field?

“I mean, yes and no. I mean, if the cautions can fall at the right times, yes, as long as I get decent restarts, yes, but again, we’re going to have to get lucky in a few spots, I think. The race is long and you can certainly do it. It’s not unachievable, but also sometimes when you’re in the back, it gives you an opportunity to do, if there’s an early caution to do a different strategy to get up there later on. If anything, I was just trying to get a decent pit stall for tomorrow and I was very surprised when it was good enough, especially it was much lifting as I felt like I had during that qualifying session. It ain’t going to be easy. I know, if you look at last week, that all seemed easy, but things really fell our way, and they’re going to have to again this weekend.”

Can you take us back to your first career win at Pocono? 

“Most of my memories come from rewatching the highlights. There are moments I do remember coming through the field. I remember the shock of when I went into the tunnel turn and spun out, blew that left rear. Back then, I’m kind of ignorant to know, well, what does that do to the car? I just kept driving it to its same capability. Truthfully back then when you had that kind of damage, it was actually a decent thing, for performance. It allowed me to really just be fast and I just remember, the biggest thing I remember is coming back through the pack so quickly that everyone would just pull over when I got near them, thinking about how different the racing is today, like it certainly would have been impossible today. It was such a great day and certainly felt like it was a big confidence boost and then we went back there, back then, we went back to that track like five, six weeks later or something like that and were able to dominate. It just gave me a ton of confidence every time I go into Pocono just because of that moment.”

Do you have to be patient or more aggressive tomorrow with your situation? 

“Depends on the situation, and it also depends on how the race is playing out. So I think I go into it being patient because I don’t know what future cautions might fall that might help us, and then I didn’t need to be aggressive and put myself in bad spots to start. So, I’ll definitely start on the patient side, and then depending on how the race falls, where I’m at, at a certain time, then I might ramp up the aggression from there on, but I think patience is the right way to start this thing.”

With the point situation you are in, does that give you more time to be patient or does it not matter with your task is? 

“I think it matters because it certainly is going to make it hard for us to get any first stage points. The guys that we were that are first and third are inside the top 10. I think that we’ll probably lose some there, but if you can somehow figure out a way to win the race, you get that jump back. So, I’m playing to win the race. I certainly don’t think that we’re going to play this thing to try to go get stage points or we feel good enough that if we get our car optimized, get the back of the car fixed back where it was. We’ll be good enough to win the race on merit and, if we lose out on stage points, then we got unlucky and we caused a tire to go flat. So that’s on us.”

Were you surprised that you got the pole with the damage? 

“Truthfully was very surprised. I had a little mini lift and turn three and four coming to the green. That affects everything from start-finish line all the way to turn two and three. I tried to run up the racetrack, tried to get a little more momentum, but I felt right from the beginning that our car did not have quite the grip that it had in practice, but the conditions were as good for me that it possibly was for anyone else. I had the coolest racetrack. I was surprised to see the time on the dash when I crossed the line. I thought I was shooting for – I thought that was probably like a P 8 to P10 executed lap on my part. The car had a decent enough speed chunk in it.”

What has made you so good in qualifying over the last few years? 

“Looking at so much information, figuring out, when Chase (Briscoe) got the pole last year, I think we were second or third, just looking at the little things that he did a little bit better than I did in qualifying. So just always looking at that stuff to try to gain hundredth here and there, and that’s usually the difference.”

Are restarts something that is eating at you? Do you feel like that is the weakness on your team right now?

“The obvious answer is yes. That’s where I feel, generally, where there’s the most to be gained, where I think that we’re the most vulnerable. If I can get that in a better spot by the time we get to the Chase, then I’m certainly going to feel better about things because the racetracks, the way they play out in the last 10, I mean, these things can come out to shootouts, and you can’t spit up five spots on, on a late race restart and give up those points. So especially when the 45 (Tyler Reddick) and Ryan (Blaney), those guys, that’s what their strengths are. So, I can’t afford to have that be such a weakness.”

Do you feel like you have to really knock out some solid finishes the next two weeks with back-to-back road courses coming up? 

“Yeah, I mean, this is the tracks that we need to win races and make hay at. We’re going to go into San Diego and Sonoma, and it’s like, give me 15th, I won’t run the race. Just award that now, I won’t go. I think that’s just the reality. I’m just far too old to spend a lot of time working on that to get better at this point in my career. It’s better if I just focus my resources on winning at the tracks that I am strong at and just understand that those four to five races we are just going to be average, but if we can make it up, by winning tracks like this, on a regular occasion, it’s still a good path to a championship.”

I’ve heard they’ve added more corner workers. Is that a good thing?

“Which is good because, I mean, this track is massive in size, right? It’s got so many different corners and twists, and certainly, you’re going to think that this thing’s going to have walls on both sides because things can get hidden pretty easily. Corners can get disguised and you end up missing a car sitting there. It’s good that they’re putting more resources to that because we certainly need it on the road courses.”

What does it mean to join the 50 win, 50 pole club?

“That’s awesome. I mean, I don’t know, those are legends and then there’s me (laughter).”