Denny Hamlin, who drove for Joe Gibbs Racing and ran his own 23XI Racing team, had a busy year in which he came close to winning his first NASCAR Cup Series championship.
Hamlin won two races and set career highs in top-five (19) and top-ten (25) finishes while battling for the regular season championship with future NASCAR Cup Series winner Kyle Larson. He won two Playoff races, at Darlington and Las Vegas, and was just a pit stop from from winning his first NASCAR Cup Series championship.
Kurt Busch, a veteran driver and former NASCAR Cup Series champion, will join his 23XI Racing squad for the 2022 season. In the organization’s first season in 2021, Bubba Wallace led the team to victory.
On paper, it’s a difficult balance to strike, but Hamlin and his partner in ownership, NBA icon Michael Jordan, delivered on the team side, and the 41-year-old Hamlin delivered on the competition side.
“My passion for work is still really, really high and I knew that I wanted to run a business,” said Hamlin. “I didn’t know what that business would be, it turns out it’s team ownership. And hopefully I make the right decisions in the long term to make that all work out.
“I had to compartmentalize my time. I had to make sure that I designated certain days for certain aspects of my life.
“… I’m planned, I’m programmed, that’s the way I work,” Hamlin added, insisting about his time behind the wheel, “I feel as good as I’ve ever felt about the driving aspect of my career.
“If you had asked me three years ago, I’d have been like, ‘ugh, how much longer do I want to do this?’ And now I have no horizon, I don’t know. As long as I stay competitive like I’ve been doing, I don’t know. I’ll race until I’m Mark Martin, I guess.”
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