Denny Hamlin won Chase Race #6 Sunday at Martinsville Speedway!

It came down to a duel between Hamlin and reigning champ, Jimmie Johnson, for the win.

Photo Credit: Geoff Burke/Getty Images for NASCAR

The final caution flag came out during a green-white-checkered finish when John Andretti spun out at the finish line. By that time, Hamlin had pulled out in front of Johnson.

“Jimmie obviously gave us a lot of respect there toward the end,” Hamlin said. “He knew that we had a faster car and tried to protect his points lead. It was a good situation we were in. We were kind of racing for nothing, and he’s obviously racing for a championship, and, honestly, it was a great run at the end.”

This is Hamlin’s 3rd win and 17th top-10 finish this season. After posting back-to-back finishes of 37th and 42nd, Hamlin dropped to 11th in the point standings. The win moved Hamlin up to 9th, 352 points back.

“It seems like whenever you have a tough week, whether it be California or Charlotte, it affects me until about Tuesday, and then it’s like, you start gearing up towards the next week,” Hamlin said. “Then you’ve got to reassess your goals. I told Mike (Ford, crew chief) at the beginning of this race, I said, let’s just get back to the top 5 in points, because it’s a shame for us to be 11th in points as competitive as we’ve been, especially the few guys that were in front of us just hadn’t either won a race or hadn’t been competitive for the most part, and we’ve just been there every single week.  The stats look terrible. So that’s frustrating.  But we reassessed our goals after Charlotte to get back in the top 5, and I think that’s feasible for us.”

It wasn’t much of a surprise that it came down to Hamlin and Johnson at the end. It was a very similar scenario during the spring race earlier this year, but Johnson bumped his way past Hamlin. The 2 were the top of the class today. Hamlin led a race-high 206 laps while Johnson led 164.

Johnson has won five of the last 6 races at Martinsville. A streak that has only been broken by Hamlin. Hamlin won the spring race last year at Martinsville.

Photo Credit: Streeter Lecka/Getty Images

With the runner-up finish, Johnson increased his lead from 90 to 118 points over 2nd place, Mark Martin. Johnson’s seeking his 4th consecutive Sprint Cup Series championship. It would the first in series history.

“Four good tracks coming up for us,” Johnson said regarding his championship quest. “If we have no issues, I feel that we can race for this championship, and things will turn out as we want. But the stuff I can’t control, I know it gives everybody something to talk about, but I’m tired of talking about all the what-ifs—and I’d just rather not.”

Juan Pablo Montoya finished 3rd. “It’s exciting to come every week out of the truck and have a fast race car,” Montoya said. “We’ve been doing it for a while now, and you know, it’s kind of funny.  I don’t know where that extra pace came from when the Chase started.  I thought we had great race cars, and right before the Chase we had good race cars.  But when the Chase started, everybody, all the pit stop crew, stepped it up, we stepped it up. It’s nice to see.”

Montoya and Jeff Gordon traded paint throughout the race. After climbing from the car, Gordon wondered what he’d done to Montoya in his post-race interview.

“We’re good,” Montoya said.  “I talked to him afterwards.  And it got to a point, it’s like, hey, I’m here, and you’re not going to push me around; you know what I mean?  If you give me room, I’ll give you room.  He wasn’t giving me any, so I played the same game. I talked got on the radio and said to the spotter, look, tell him if he comes I’m going to give him space, but I hope he does the same.  Right at the end we ran together and he gave me room and I gave him room.  I mean, you can do it.  It’s just you’ve got to sometimes set a precedent so people back off a little. It’s okay.  I never really had a big problem with him, but he’s always so hard to race against.  But he probably says the same thing against me, because he never gave me any room, why am I going to give him any.  It’s a vicious circle.”

Kyle Busch finished 4th followed by Jeff Gordon, Jamie McMurray, Ryan Newman, Mark Martin, Tony Stewart and Kevin Harvick completing the top-10.

For the (unofficial) race results, click here.

There were 15 cautions for 77 laps and 21 lead changes among 12 drivers: R. Newman 1-21; J. Gordon 22-46; J. Andretti 47; D. Gilliland 48; J. Gordon 49-58; J. Johnson 59-89; R. Newman 90; J. Johnson 91-130; R. Newman 131; J. Johnson 132-140; J. Montoya 141-177; J. Gordon 178; J. Burton 179-182; D. Hamlin 183-201; Kyle Busch 202-205; D. Hamlin 206-253; G. Biffle 254-259; J. Johnson 260-301; M. Martin 302; D. Reutimann 303-320; J. Johnson 321-362; D. Hamlin 363-501

The Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup continues at Talledega Superspeedway on Sunday, November 1st. TV coverage starts at 12 Noon on ABC.