Denny Hamlin at the Checker O’Reilly Auto Parts 500 presented by Pennzoil at Phoenix International Raceway. Denny Hamlin led a total of 91 laps, but finished 12th after a late-race incident with Brad Keselowski. Their ongoing feud has sparked interest and intrigue throughout the 2009 Nationwide season. (Credit: Jason Smith/Getty Images for NASCAR)

In recent years, many NASCAR fans have complained that drivers have become vanilla — too politically correct with no personality, just talking heads for sponsors outside the race car. Race fans yearned for the days when drivers like Darrell Waltrip and Dale Earnhardt spiced things up when they got out of the car.

Tony Stewart came along in the late 90s and spiced things up in the NASCAR garage with the determination to speak his mind, critics be damned. Aside from Stewart, though, the NASCAR garage maintained that somewhat politically correct, boring feel as the new century began.

Then Kyle Busch came along a few years later with an attitude that illustrated how much he hated to lose. Even a second-place finish didn’t make the young driver happy. Unlike most of his fellow-drivers, Busch let everyone know when he wasn’t happy, even if he had just finished second.

While Stewart and Busch were willing to speak their minds, NASCAR fans still missed that two-man rivalry — two drivers who seemed to hate each other, each thinking nothing of getting in the way of the other’s success.

Race fans may have gotten what they wished for at the fall 2008 Nationwide Series race at Lowe's Motor Speedway with a difference of opinion between Denny Hamlin and Brad Keselowski on whether or not Keselowski was racing harder than necessary.

At first, the two drivers not seeing eye to eye just seemed like one of those “racing deals” that would be history in a matter of a couple of weeks. The rivalry, though, was rekindled in 2009, and Hamlin and Keselowski seem to be unable to escape it to this day.

Hamlin’s and Keselowski’s cars seemed to be magnetically attracted to each other throughout the last half of 2009. No matter whether it was a Nationwide Series or Sprint Cup Series race they were both running in, their cars seemed to find each other on the race track. More often than not, seemingly apparent contact ensued.

After each incident and even following some races in which the two ran incident-free, Hamlin always talked about how Keselowski was racing too hard, being too aggressive, not using his head, and making enemies of his fellow-competitors. In turn, Keselowski would always defend himself, that the situations called for aggressiveness, that he wasn’t going to take anything from anybody, and that he wouldn’t be pushed around.

Most of the antics betweeen Hamlin and Keselowski were limited to the Nationwide Series in 2009, but with Keselowski moving to Penske Racing to compete in the Sprint Cup Series full-time in 2010, the rivalry is sure to carry over to the Sprint Cup garage — especially since it didn’t seem resolved at the close of the 2009 season.

Things hadn’t even cooled off between the two by the time awards banquet time rolled around. At the Nationwide Series banquet, Keselowski joked that he was concerned about what fellow drivers were going to say about him in his intro.

A couple of weeks later, Hamlin took advantage of the opportunity to joke about the ongoing feud during his speech at the Sprint Cup Series banquet. While thanking his sponsors, he mentioned that sunglasses would have come in handy when “sun got in his eyes” causing him to spin Keselowski.

Hamlin may be a Sprint Cup veteran now, and Keselowski is embarking on his first full-time season in the Cup Series, but the rivalry that has brewed between the two may very well be just what the doctor ordered for fans that have been yearning for the brash excitement they used to enjoy from NASCAR legends of years past.