Denny Hamlin dominated, Dale Earnhardt Jr led with three laps to go but Clint Bowyer walked away with the victory in Saturday night's Crown Royal 400 at the Richmond International Raceway.
A concerted effort by NASCAR to ensure that the three-quarter mile Richmond oval would enjoy its 17th consecutive sell-out resulted in home crowd favourite Denny Hamlin repaying his fellow Virginians' faith by smashing the record for the most number of laps led in a 400-lap race at the D-shaped oval. However Friday's Nationwide Series race winner wasn't able to deliver a maiden Cup Series victory at the track he and his family attended as a child when a deflating tyre ended his hopes with less than 20 laps remaining.
From pole position Hamlin's dominance was enough to send most crowds to the concession stands but his home fans were quite happy to stay in their seats as their man led an incredible 381 of the first 382 laps with only occasional, and fleeting resistance from Mark Martin and the man who would eventually turn into the villain of the evening, Kyle Busch.
With just three brief caution periods slowing the action through the first 200 laps Hamlin was able to stretch the legs of his Joe Gibbs racing machine and obliterate the competition with Marin holding on to second place but never able to get within two seconds of the flying #11 FedEx Toyota. Behind the leaders the main story concerned the lack of competitiveness shown by Jeff Gordon and Jimmie Johnson in the early stages with Gordon (who started 43rd after changing the engine on Saturday morning) going a lap down as early as lap 44and Johnson only avoiding being lapped when the second caution flag of the race waved on lap 128 for debris.
![Clint Bowyer - Jack Daniels Chevrolet [pic credit: GM media]](http://pix.crash.net/thumbs/289103.jpg)
