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Raybestos Motorsports
HAMLIN CRUSHES FIELD IN MICHIGAN
GIVES RAYBESTOS® BRAND BRAKES SEVENTH WIN OF 2010 SEASON
Brooklyn, Mich. (June 13, 2010) In the midst of crushing the field Sunday afternoon at Michigan International Speedway, Denny Hamlin thought about how special the 2010 season has been for him and the No. 11 FedEx team.
“I just found myself thinking in the middle of the race it’s unbelievable how good we are this year and how good our race cars are,” Hamlin said. “I feel like I’ve learned a whole lot about how to make a race winning car and tell Mike [Ford, crew chief] the things that we need to make our car a race winning car and he does an excellent job transforming that on to on-track performance. It’s a team effort.”
Hamlin gave Raybestos® brand Brakes, a member of the Affinia Group family of brands, their SEVENTH NASCAR Sprint Cup Series win in 2010. Cars using Raybestos® brake products have won FIVE superspeedway races and two of three short-track events.
Hamlin led a race-high 123 of 200 laps and his advantage over second stretched to 10 seconds at one point during the middle stages of the race. He was leading by nine seconds when the final caution of the race waved on lap 183 for debris. When the race went green on lap 188, Hamlin slowly pulled away from second-place Kasey Kahne and beat him to the checkered flag 12 laps later to win, crossing the finish line 1.246 seconds ahead of his rival.
After the race Hamlin was asked if he could recall such a dominating performance.
“In late models I did but the competition level is a little different,” Hamlin said. “I’ve had days at Pocono like this. We never stopped working. Regardless of whether we have a 9/10ths of a second lead or a nine-second lead, we’re constantly trying to make our car better. I think we’ve got some ideas to improve our car the next time we come back.
“We’re not going to get complacent. Even though it looks strong, it’s not as easy as it looked today. Friday and Saturday [practice and qualifying] were somewhat of a struggle for us. We got lucky qualifying seventh simply because we went out early. We probably should have qualified 15th to 20th if we went out any later. We just capitalized and did everything we were supposed to do to win.”
The only hiccup for the team came after a green flag pit stop when Hamlin had trouble coming up to speed, something that greatly concerned the driver.
“We ran out of fuel and it picked up some air right there on pit lane,” Hamlin said. “I was very worried. I thought we had a mechanical issue with something broke inside the motor.
“We had a similar issue at the start of the Pocono race last year where we broke a fuel cable. I thought that’s what we did. When I it went to take off, it immediately shut off so I thought maybe we spun a cable like we did last year. But once it picked back up I was pretty confident we weren’t going to have it again. That particular run, we had been out front for the first time, used more throttle than we used all day. The driver wasn’t as good with fuel mileage. I didn’t think we were going to be low on fuel. He assured me that it’s just one one-time thing.”
Hamlin is third in the series championship standings, 47 points behind leader Kevin Harvick and 25 behind second-place Kyle Busch. The win was the 13th for Hamlin in 166 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series races. He led the most laps for the second consecutive race and is tied with Kyle Busch (4-4) for the lead in the WIX Filters Lap Leader standings.
Hamlin averaged 156.386 mph in a race that took 2 hours, 33 minutes and 28 seconds to complete. There were 18 lead changes among nine driers in a race that was slowed by four cautions for 14 laps.
To gain a competitive advantage at Michigan, the Joe Gibbs cars used the Raybestos® Sprint Cup braking system. The ultra-lightweight aluminum alloy six-piston calipers are the stiffest and lightest calipers available in all of NASCAR. The innovative calipers were developed using Raybestos® technology partner Alcon’s state of the art “optimized design” process, and include an asymmetric body design and advanced between-piston and crossover cooling features. The brake package also provides for the largest brake pad volume (surface area) and largest rotor (13.15” outside diameter, and 1.65” thick) available in NASCAR.
Raybestos® brand brake and chassis parts are produced by affiliated companies in Affinia’s Global Brake and Chassis Group, the leading manufacturer of braking systems and chassis parts in the transportation industry. The brake line includes everything from brake drums to rotors, pads, shoes and hydraulic parts, while the chassis line features tie rods, ball points, idler arms and sway bar links. Raybestos brand braking and chassis systems are also the only systems used by NASCAR’s Joe Gibbs Racing in competition. For more information about Raybestos brakes, visit Raybestos.com. For more information on Raybestos Chassis visit RaybestosChassis.com
Affinia Group Inc. is an innovative global leader in the design, manufacture, distribution and marketing of industrial grade products and services, including extensive offerings of aftermarket parts for automotive and heavy-duty vehicles. With more than $1.8 billion in annual revenue, Affinia has operations in North and South America, Europe, Asia and India. For more information, visit www.affiniagroup.com.
Alcon Components USA is a wholly owned subsidiary of Alcon Components Limited, the UK based manufacturer of premium brake and clutch products. Alcon systems are engineered and designed for the most rigorous demands and are widely used throughout the world of motorsport, from Formula One to IndyCar to NASCAR, as well as in various high performance road vehicles including Jaguar, Land Rover and Bentley. For more information, visit www.alconusa.com.
*Affinia Group Inc.’s affiliated companies include Brake Parts Inc. WIX Filtration Corp LLC, Affinia Products Corp LLC and other high quality manufacturers of the Affinia family of brands.
