CONCORD, N.C. - This was the one race Denny Hamlin has been dreaming about.
The veteran NASCAR driver finally got the victory he has coveted for the past 17 years, holding off Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Kyle Busch in overtime Sunday night to win the longest - and perhaps wildest - Coca-Cola 600 in history.
Hamlin won for the 48th time in his Cup Series career, but for the time in a points race at Charlotte Motor Speedway.
"It is so special. That is the last big one that is not on my resumé," said Hamlin, who has won the Daytona 500 and the Southern 500 three times each as well as the NASCAR All-Star Race. "We weren't very good all day but got ourselves in the right place at the right time."
Car owner Joe Gibbs said he knew this was an important victory for Hamlin.
"With Denny to race that hard and that long and to be here and know how important this race is right here in our backyard, this is just a huge deal," Gibbs said.
NASCAR's longest and most grueling race was especially so this year, lasting more than five hours and requiring 619 miles to complete. There were 18 caution flags, and 16 drivers failed to finish. The race featured a 12-car wreck and a magnificent crash that sent Chris Buescher's car flipping over five times before stopping upside down.
"This is the wildest and craziest 600 that has ever happened," TV analyst Clint Bowyer said at one point on the Fox Sports broadcast.
Kyle Larson, the reigning Cup Series champion and the Coca-Cola 600 winner a year ago, had struggled with adversity all night, incurring two pit penalties, a fire in his pit stall and on the back of his car and a spin out. Yet he found himself with a golden chance to win when he took the lead with 46 laps left.
But with two laps left, Chase Briscoe tried to pass Larson and crashed, bringing out the yellow caution flag and sending the race to overtime.
Larson had the inside lane on the restart in overtime, but Austin Dillon got a push from the second row and soon was running four wide with Larson, Hamlin and Ross Chastain. But a crash ensued involving several cars, with Larson nipping Dillon to send both cars spinning.
"I got a little loose and tried to make it stick," Dillon said. "It didn't quite work out there. I had to do what I had to do to win the race given where we are in points. We had a shot there to bring home another 600."
The crash ended Larson's chance to become the first repeat winner of the event since Jimmie Johnson won three straight from 2003-05. Larson wound up finishing ninth.
It also set up Hamlin for the win. On the next restart, Hamlin took the lead in his Toyota and held off teammate Busch. Stewart-Haas Racing's Kevin Harvick finished third and fellow Ford driver Briscoe was fourth. JGR's Christopher Bell was fifth, with sixth-place Tyler Reddick securing the highest finish for a Chevrolet.
"Considering how my day went, I was going to be content with a fourth-place finish," Hamlin said.
He was glad to get something much bigger.
"I've been a Coke family driver for 18 years. Never won the Coke 600 before. This means a lot," Hamlin said.
There was a huge wreck on the 192nd lap when Ryan Blaney, the All-Star winner a week earlier at Texas Motor Speedway, got too low on the apron on the bottom of the track and spun back up it. That started a chain reaction that caught up 12 cars, sending some of NASCAR's top stars - Kurt Busch, Brad Keselowski, Bubba Wallace, William Byron and Chase Elliott among them - behind the wall for good.
Elliott led 93 laps before the crash and appeared to be the car to beat.
"It's chaos out there," Byron said. "You can't drive the car the slightest bit sideways or you're wrecked. So if somebody gets a little bit sideways, then we all wreck. It either takes out other people or they spin to the infield. Just chaos."
Said Busch: "I think I hit about 15 different things."
Blaney said the wreck occurred when he got too low on the apron at the bottom of the track.
"Gosh, I hate it," Blaney said. "Makes you feel pretty dumb for doing that. I hate it tore up our car and a handful of others. I just didn't know where I was at and just made a mistake."
The carnage wasn't over as Buescher's No. 17 Ford flipped five times before landing on its roof after a collision on the front stretch with Daniel Suarez. Buescher had to wait until track officials flipped his car back over before he could get out.
He said that it was more painful than his previous flip at Talladega Superspeedway.
"I do appreciate them for helping me and setting it back over again, so thank you to everybody working for not slamming it back," Buescher said. "It was nice to be able to get out. The blood is rushing to your head a little bit. I guess I could have pulled the belts and fallen right to the ground, but figured I'd just wait on them."
Elliott won the first stage in his Hendrick Motorsports Chevy, while TrackHouse Racing teammates Suarez and Chastain won the second and third stages, respectively.
The race also included Tanner Andrews, a tire changer for Joey Logano's pit crew, getting his right foot clipped by pole sitter Hamlin on pit road.
The second half of the regular season continues next weekend at World Wide Technology Raceway near St. Louis.