Hamlin gives Toyota first Cup win

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."

All the JGR cars looked very strong and they pretty much dominated the race. Kyle Busch led 15 laps and looked a strong candidate for victory in the other Gibbs Toyota, before handing the lead to his teammate Stewart on lap 54.

The second of the two Gatorade Duels proved much more eventful than the first.

On lap 17, as they left turn four, Jacques Villeneuve lost control of what was visibly a very loose Toyota. He tried to regain control but ended up crashing with Dario Franchitti, taking him, Jamie McMurray and Stanton Barrett out of contention.

"The car was real loose all day and there we got it three-wide and just got loose one time too many," Villeneuve said. "It's a shame because the car was actually quite quick and the whole crew worked really hard to get us here. That's very annoying but that's the way racing goes."

Patrick Carpentier was close to make the field for his first ever Daytona 500, but ended up in the wall after the left-front tyre on his No. 10 Dodge gave up. His incident forced the race to be red-flagged just a handful of laps before the end.

"The last six laps the car was really, really pushy and I hit the wall about four times," said Carpentier. "I hit it a couple of times pretty hard down on the back there, one time down there between three and four and just kept riding the wall.

"I knew something was going to happen but I was hoping we could make it to the end before."

In contrast Dale Jarrett, who is making his last few races as a Sprint Cup driver, was a happy man as he locked himself in the field for his last Daytona 500. He got good help from his teammates, who were already in the field for Sunday, pushing Jarrett from the back to the front of the field.

"I didn't think we were going to have any problems," Jarrett said. "I just wanted to take care and make sure that we were okay there and then after that restart I knew it was time to go.

"Michael (Waltrip) came back there and gave me the pushes that I needed to get some of those places. The car drove extremely well and that was the key to this."

John Andretti will also make the field for Sunday's race after charging through the field on new tyres following his last pit stop under caution. He crossed the line tenth just behind Jarrett's Toyota.

Besides Villeneuve and Carpentier, Ken Schrader, Eric McClure and Stanton Barrett also failed to make the field.

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