Will Denny Hamlin make the Championship 4?

Can Denny Hamlin advance to the Championship 4 this year? According to historical data, he has about an 88% chance at it.

The first 4-time winner in a season has advanced to the Championship 4 in seven of the last eight seasons – dating back to 2017 when NASCAR added playoff points to its elimination-style playoff format. The only one who didn’t was Kyle Larson in 2024.

In 2025, Denny Hamlin doesn’t want to join Larson on that very short list.

Hamlin became the first 4-time winner of 2025 when he won at Dover Motor Speedway in July. Before that, he also won at Martinsville in March, Darlington in April and Michigan in June.

“It’s the goal at the beginning of the year is to make the Championship 4,” he said before the start of the playoffs. “To do that, you obviously have to put in some work during the regular season and you’ve got to perform well in the playoffs.”

Hamlin has. The Joe Gibbs Racing driver’s most-recent victory was in the playoffs – at Gateway in September. He also finished second at Kansas after leading 159 of 273 laps and winning both stages.

Before the playoffs began, Hamlin saw this coming. In fact, he drew from historical data about himself.

“I think our record in the Playoffs speaks for itself. Our average finish drops every year in the Playoffs. We run better every year in the final 10 than what we do in the regular season,” he said.

Hamlin is right. In 2025, his season average finish has dropped from 13.9 at the end of the regular season to 13.3 after five playoff races. In 2024, it dropped from 15.0 to 13.9. Then, in 2022, it dropped from 19.0 to 15.6. 3.4 positions.

Hamlin has qualified for the Championship 4 on four occasions – 2014 and 2019-21 – but never in the NextGen era, dating back to 2022.

Entering this weekend’s cutoff race for the Round of 12, at the Charlotte Motor Speedway Roval road course, Hamlin is ranked fourth in points with a 48-point advantage over the cutline.

A Round of 8 berth looks easy for Hamlin. Advancing from the Round of 8 to the Championship 4 looks a little harder – even with his points advantage.

“We’ve never cruised through that third round. It doesn’t matter which racetrack it’s been, it always gets tight there,” Hamlin said. “With Talladega being in the second-to-last round, I just don’t know how many points you would have to have to feel comfortable going into that round.”

If Hamlin can make the Championship 4, he’ll look to become the fourth driver to win the Cup championship after being the first win four races that season.

If not, he’ll be the first driver since 2017 to have multiple seasons where they didn’t win the championship after making the Championship 4 and being the first to four wins:

• Martin Truex Jr., 2017
• Kevin Harvick, 2018
• Kyle Busch, 2019
• Denny Hamlin, 2020
• Kyle Larson, 2021
• Chase Elliott, 2022
• William Byron, 2023

Other Statistics

With 59 wins in his NASCAR Cup Series career, Hamlin holds the all-time record for most career wins without a Cup title. Hamlin is also one win away from tying Kevin Harvick for 10th on the series’ all-time wins list. Hamlin has said he wants to be among the Top-10 all-time when he is done racing.

At Kansas, Hamlin cracked the Top-10 on another Cup Series list. He earned his 374th career Top-10 finish, tying Ricky Rudd for 10th on the series’ all-time Top-10 list.

Hamlin’s next Top-10 finish will put him solidly in the Top-10 all-time – and tied for ninth with 7-time Cup champion Jimmie Johnson.