Kevin Harvick isn’t the only driver who’s endured less-than-favorable treatment from a few fans in the aftermath of Sunday’s controversial finish at Talladega Superspeedway. Drivers were nearly unanimous in their support of the change, even when it came into play in a race that cut four drivers from the Chase field.
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“They can look at it 100 different ways, but you can’t quit. You can’t roll over and be done with it and say, ‘We tried our best,”‘ Harvick said.
“We’ve had a really sloppy six weeks, and we’re very fortunate to be sitting here today”, Harvick said.
Harvick informed his team under caution he had a mechanical issue that was preventing him from accelerating, but he stayed in line and his inability to go on the restart triggered the race-ending accident.
“Do I like the fact that there’s somebody with an engine that is under-powered starting right in the middle of the pack?” “It’s just one of those situations where I did the best I could on the restarts to get going and I got out of the way”. You have to try.
NASCAR should be extremely sensitive to accusations of race manipulation, particularly since the 2013 fiasco at Richmond in which Michael Waltrip Racing used a series of maneuvers to put a driver in the Chase. You can appreciate him playing along but for those exasperated by what has happened in the latest rendition of NASCAR’s playoff format the answers they got over the past few days are not going to satisfy anyone.
Kyle Busch, a JGR teammate of Kenseth, Hamlin and Edwards, offered another reason why Harvick escaped without sanctions.
“Kevin Harvick’s actions were fishy”, Gordon said. I don’t think that’s what racing is about. But if he moved out of the way, he risked falling to the back of the field and potentially being knocked out of the Chase. – Truex finished seventh at Talladega and secured his place in the Eliminator Round of the Chase. “They were aware of that, and it appears that they caused that caution”. “That makes me uncomfortable that if that’s the case, that a team could do something like that, that’s calculated to alter the outcome of the most important race of the year”.
“The five cars at the NASCAR Research & Development Center for post-race inspection are the No. 22 (winner), No. 88 (runner-up), No. 18 (final auto qualifying for the Eliminator Round), No. 31 (first vehicle not qualifying for the Eliminator Round) and the No. 98 (random)”.
He had a more understanding approach Tuesday to the criticism from Kenseth and Hamlin, but said he didn’t feel the need to speak to either driver about the Talladega ending.
“Denny is a very emotional person”, Harvick said. Is a finish like we saw Sunday easily explainable to people and going to cause others to pay money to sit in the stands? He said the last time he quit something was his wrestling season his senior year of high school.
“If I post a picture on Instagram and then all the comments come up on my phone after I post something, the same thing on Twitter, but when the comments come up and it’s like, ‘You’re a jerk.’ And there a lot of things I can’t say right now, but I smile every time because I think it’s kind of amusing because a few of them are pretty creative”. He said he felt at the time he was making the correct decision, but eventually realized how much he let his team down and failed to finish out his high school career.
Harvick acknowledged that the pressure of the Chase dictated his strategy in the closing laps Sunday. Had it been a regular-season race, Harvick acknowledged he likely would have headed to pit road when his engine began to fail.
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While Logano stressed that he doesn’t condone fans throwing any kind of debris onto the track during or after a race, he couldn’t help but recall an occasion when fans at Talladega threw beer cans at Jeff Gordon after a victory. “You have to try”, he said. If it falls on the face and you crash, you still had that little glimmer of hope.
