DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. - Denny Hamlin, considered perhaps the best NASCAR driver without a Cup Series championship, can look past that hole on his record.
He instead points to a Bristol night race victory, a pair of Southern 500 trophies, three wins on road courses, six at Pocono Raceway and considerable success at the big daddy of them all: the Daytona 500.
It's the shiniest of NASCAR's crown jewels, the one race that can define a career, and only two drivers have more Daytona 500 wins than Hamlin, whose three victories lead all active drivers. Richard Petty (seven Daytona 500 wins) and Cale Yarborough (four) are both in the NASCAR Hall of Fame, and so are the other three drivers besides Hamlin with three wins: Bobby Allison, Jeff Gordon and Dale Jarrett.
And now Hamlin is set to attempt to become the first driver to win "The Great American Race" three times in a row, a feat that would forever dull the disappointment of his failure to win a season championship despite five top-four finishes, including as the 2010 runner-up.
"This is something that no one's ever done before," Hamlin said. "Other guys have won championships, obviously. I would want to do something no one else has done."
The Daytona 500 broadcast begins at 2:30 p.m. Sunday on Fox. Hamlin is the 8-1 betting favorite, but this superspeedway battle can be a crapshoot, particularly in NASCAR's condensed new schedule forced by the pandemic. Speedweeks at Daytona International Speedway for decades spanned nearly two weeks but this year was cut to just six days.
The only real track time for Daytona 500 entrants came from a single practice session, Wednesday's time trials and Thursday's 150-mile twin qualifying races. Rain washed out the final two practices Saturday, when a morning and afternoon session were planned for Cup Series drivers.
There is no clear indication whose cars are most capable of winning, and the loss of Saturday's track time is potentially a major setback for the nine drivers switching cars.
Former Cup Series champions Brad Keselowski and Martin Truex Jr. as well as front-row qualifier William Byron are among those forced into backup cars because of trouble in Thursday night's qualifiers. Anthony Alfredo, Chase Briscoe, Ross Chastain, Cole Custer, Kaz Grala and Erik Jones also switched cars and will have to start the race from the back of the 40-car field, along with Byron, Keselowski and Truex.
"I think we proved as an industry last year that track time was a little overrated," said David Wilson, head of Toyota Racing Development. "These are professional-caliber sporting organizations and the expectation is they show up to the arena, to the race track, prepared to race.
"Obviously, the 500 is wrapped around a lot of tradition, and we all love that and we're grateful that we have a little bit of track time for the guys that get their hands dirty. They always like to be able to get out there on track and make sure that everything is running as it should."
Hendrick Motorsports swept the front row in qualifying with Alex Bowman and Byron, who got collected in a wreck Thursday, forcing the switch to a backup ride and allowing Stewart-Haas Racing's Aric Almirola slide up to second for the start of the race.
The venue will have a noticeably empty feeling because pandemic restrictions have limited attendance to roughly 30,000 spectators in the grandstands. Daytona was at capacity with 101,000 in the grandstands a year ago and several thousand more camping in the infield.
Everything has been scaled down this year, and there's a heavy presence of fencing and gates to keep the competition bubble contained. Movement inside the speedway is restricted to the point that Hamlin was stymied taking his usual route to victory lane this past week when he tried to get to the ring ceremony for his 2020 Daytona 500 victory.
Said Hamlin: "I felt like a mouse trying to find the cheese."
Now 40 years old and beginning his 16th season with Joe Gibbs Racing, he has made significant strides to leave his mark on NASCAR. His 44 career victories are tied with Bill Elliott - yet another Hall of Famer and Hamlin's childhood idol - and those statement victories have qualified him as one of the best of his generation.
Hamlin has grown off the track as well, including a move into team ownership. He formed 23XI Racing with NBA legend Michael Jordan, and Bubba Wallace drove the No. 23 Toyota to a second-place finish in one of Thursday's qualifiers.
So Hamlin will be competing against his own race car Sunday, but 23XI is part of the Toyota group and aligned with JGR. Hamlin and Wallace will likely work together over the course of 500 miles, but when it's time to go, Hamlin will be thinking only of his own spot in history.
Last November, he came up short in the winner-take-all season finale for the fourth time in his career, but Hamlin has nothing to prove to anyone.
And yet a third straight Daytona 500 win would prove so much.