NASCAR: Another Joe Gibbs Racing announcement coming?

Joe Gibbs Racing still have a seat open for two NASCAR Xfinity Series races, but the driver for one of them should be considered a lock.

Joe Gibbs Racing announced in June that reigning ARCA Menards Series East champion and current points leader Sammy Smith is set to drive the “star car”, the #18 Toyota, in eight of the remaining races on the 2022 NASCAR Xfinity Series schedule. His schedule has since been expanded to nine races.

This move filled the “star car” for the majority of its remaining open races. Before the announcement was made, there had been 11 races for which a driver was still not yet confirmed. Smith has made five starts thus far.

Seven drivers have driven the car in the season’s first 23 races, and four drivers, including Smith, are now confirmed for eight of the final 10.

As a result, there are still two races remaining on this year’s schedule without a confirmed driver of the #18 Toyota.

But one of those races is the race at Darlington Raceway on Saturday, September 3, and it should go without saying who will drive the “star car” in this race.

Joe Gibbs Racing Cup Series driver Denny Hamlin has competed in an Xfinity Series race at Darlington Raceway for Joe Gibbs’s organization during each of the last seven seasons going back to 2015, so there is no reason to believe he won’t do so again this year.

UPDATE: Hamlin has been confirmed as the driver of the #18 Toyota for this Saturday’s race.

He won three of those seven races, though his 2019 win was stripped from him via a post-race disqualification.

Confirmation of Hamlin’s 2021 Darlington Raceway Xfinity Series start came during race week, so expect it to come sometime soon.

In 14 career Xfinity Series starts at the track, the 41-year-old Chesterfield, Virginia native has five official wins and three runner-up finishes. He finished in 12th place in his start at the track last year, which was his first ever finish of lower than eighth (aside from the disqualification, which officially dropped him from first to 38th).

He also his four wins in 20 Cup Series starts at the four-turn, 1.366-mile (2.198-kilometer) egg-shaped oval in Darlington, South Carolina, including a victory in last year’s playoff race.

Darlington Raceway is in a unique position on the schedule in that it hosts the Cup Series playoff opener, but the Xfinity Series race is not a playoff race, despite the fact that it takes place one day prior. If it were an Xfinity Series playoff race, Hamlin would not be allowed to compete.

Despite the fact that there are still two NASCAR Xfinity Series races without a confirmed driver of the #18 Toyota for 2022, the one that should be focused on is the playoff race at the Charlotte Motor Speedway Roval on Saturday, October 8, as it is highly unlikely that anybody other than Hamlin will get the nod for the race at Darlington Raceway.