Denny Hamlin suffered a fracture in his lower back throughout Sunday's last-lap accident at Fontana, Calif., his racing team said Monday. Joe Gibbs Racing unveiled the damage and said Hamlin was anticipated to be released soon from the Southern California hospital to come back home. He has what's called an L1 compression fracture; primarily, the initial vertebra in the back element of his spine collapsed. There was no word on how long his recovery would take. JGR said he'll be considered by Dr. Jerry Petty of Carolina Neurosurgery and Spine Associates later this week. Hamlin was airlifted from the track after having a accident with Joey Logano on the penultimate turn sent him almost head-on into the inside wall. Logano was able to finish next despite wrecking to the external wall after striking Hamlin, who spun Logano a week ago at Bristol and started a bitter post-race confrontation. "He probably shouldn't have done what he did last week, so that is what he gets," Logano said Sunday following the race won by Kyle Busch. Tony Stewart found myself in a shoving match with Logano, who strongly blocked Stewart out of a late restart. Hamlin's team needs Logano to be fined. Before an ambulance arrived Hamlin got herself out of the car, but declined to the bottom beside it. He was eventually airlifted out because of traffic across the track. His lover, Jordan Fish, tweeted afterward that Hamlin was "alert d alert, principal interest is his back." The damage is really a bit more common in open-wheel race, which includes had three situations of individuals breaking their backs since 2009. Perseverence broke several vertebrae in his back in a 2009 accident all through practice at Sonoma and missed that event and the remaining three events of the season. He couldn't teach for two months and used a straight back support for almost four months. As he healed during the offseason he also suffered a fracture of his last thoracic vertebrae in the 2011 season ending at Vegas but missed no racing. Justin Wilson fractured his sixth thoracic vertebra in 2011 and missed the last six races of the season. Wilson said he was in a back support for 10 months. In NASCAR, Sterling Marlin missed the final seven events of the 2002 season with a broken vertebra in his throat.
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