DENNY HAMLIN CLAIMS HISTORIC VICTORY
All three Toyota partner teams in the top-three for second time in history
BROOKLYN, Mich (June 7, 2026) – Denny Hamlin delivered a historic victory as he tied the late Kyle Busch with 63 Cup Series wins. He drove away late to win by more than 10 seconds at Michigan International Speedway. With the win, Hamlin becomes the first driver in Toyota’s history to win 60 NASCAR Cup Series races.
Michigan-native Erik Jones had a season-best result for LEGACY MOTOR CLUB as he brought his Camry home in second, while 23XI Racing’s Bubba Wallace finished third – giving Toyota a second straight top-three sweep for the first time in our history. It is the second time Toyota has swept the top-three finishing positions with three different organizations (Darlington-2 2025).
Toyota drivers also swept the weekend at Michigan with Gio Ruggiero winning on Friday in ARCA, Corey Heim claiming victory on Saturday in Trucks and Hamlin’s win today.
TOYOTA RACING Post-Race Recap
NASCAR Cup Series (NCS)
Michigan International Speedway
Race 15 of 36 – 400 miles, 200 laps
TOYOTA FINISHING POSITIONS
1st, DENNY HAMLIN
2nd, ERIK JONES
3rd, BUBBA WALLACE
4th, Kyle Larson*
5th, Carson Hocevar*
10th, CHASE BRISCOE
13th, RILEY HERBST
14th, JOHN HUNTER NEMECHEK
25th, TY GIBBS
31st, CHRISTOPHER BELL
35th, TYLER REDDICK
*non-Toyota driver
TOYOTA QUOTES
DENNY HAMLIN, No. 11 National Debt Relief Toyota Camry XSE, Joe Gibbs Racing
Finishing Position: 1st
What does it mean to tie Kyle Busch with 63 wins?
“The off-season has been so tough for the whole NASCAR community, and we’ve been losing a lot of people. It is an honor. The only way I could tie him, was to outlive him. He was just an amazing competitor. Someone that I learned so much from, and that last run, I drove as hard as I could to stink them up like Kyle (Busch) did.”
Can you talk about that last run?
“This is a really momentum based race track. I didn’t think I was going to clear those guys on the frontstretch. It just happened when they were side drafting, it allowed me to clear. That was it for us.”
How much did you have to work on the race car?
“We were legit 30th. We were a 30th place car at the beginning. We couldn’t do anything with it, but the moment the track came to us, and we got some track position and had some great restarts and this thing woke up right where it was yesterday.”
Toyota is winning the Heritage Trophy for the third straight year, and you have delivered it twice. What does that mean to you?
“Amazing. 1-2-3 for Toyota, and all three Toyota organizations, 1-2-3. It is fantastic. The LEGACY guys, great finish for them. Bubba (Wallace), awesome job. This is momentum that both of those teams need.”
ERIK JONES, No. 43 Dollar Tree Toyota Camry XSE, LEGACY MOTOR CLUB
Finishing Position: 2nd
What does it mean to be on the podium at Michigan?
“Yeah, it is good. It is a nice day. It is disappointing in some ways. To have the car we had; it’s not we fluked into second, we were running up here all day. We had a fast Dollar Tree Camry. It just didn’t work perfectly. You need everything to go well. Restarts got chaotic at the end, and the last one didn’t work out for us, and I had to pick through traffic. By time I got up there, the race was over and Denny (Hamlin) was gone. A lot of positives to take away. The car was really fast. I couldn’t ask much more out of it for balance. We will work on it, and if we keep bringing cars like this, we will win races soon.”
TYLER REDDICK, No. 45 ROCKSTAR ENERGY DRINK Toyota Camry XSE, 23XI Racing
Finishing Position: 35th
Are you okay and what happened out there?
“It was a bit smoky in there, just caught quite a bit of stuff there on the left side, and it got knocked around, so just a lot of exhaust, brings some smoke in. I’m alright, just a bummer for our ROCKSTAR ENERGY DRINK Toyota Camry. I felt like we had really good speed. We were set up with a good restart to get second there, and maybe race for the lead there, and just an all-around bummer. I wanted to come in here and have a good points day. We had really, really good speed yesterday and it showed again today. All-in-all, it’s a bummer. It’s a race I felt like we could have won, got away from us. All year long, we’ve done a really good job at staying out of messes like this, so it’s unfortunate to have it happen. At least we got a couple of stage points, we will see if we get back out there. I haven’t heard if we can fix it yet. We will just have to grind it out. It’s not going to be great, and going out early next week in qualifying, we will have our work cut out for us starting early in Pocono, but we will see if we can get our Camry fixed and move up a couple of more spots, if possible.”
About Toyota
Toyota (NYSE:TM) has been a part of the cultural fabric in North America for nearly 70 years, and is committed to advancing sustainable, next-generation mobility through our Toyota and Lexus brands, plus our more than 1,800 dealerships.
Toyota directly employs nearly 64,000 people in North America who have contributed to the design, engineering, and assembly of over 50 million cars and trucks at our 14 manufacturing plants. In 2025, Toyota’s plant in North Carolina began to assemble automotive batteries for electrified vehicles.
For more information about Toyota, visit www.ToyotaNewsroom.com.
