No. 29 Budweiser Chevrolet
Hollywood Casino 400 at Kansas Speedway
Budweiser Racing Team Notes of Interest
• After struggling with the car’s handling for most of the day, Kevin Harvick and the No. 29 team made wholesale changes on their final pit stop and raced their way back toward the front to score a sixth-place finish in Sunday’s Hollywood Casino 400 at Kansas Speedway.
• Harvick started Sunday’s race from the 14th position and worked his way up to 10th before the caution flag waved for the first time at lap 19. He radioed to the team that he was loose off the corner and needed more forward bite. Crew chief Gil Martin called for a four-tire stop with an air pressure adjustment.
• On the following run Harvick complained that the car was just “sideways,” as he raced his way up to the seventh position before green-flag pit stops began. The No. 29 team made a track bar adjustment and took four tires when Harvick brought the Budweiser Chevrolet to pit road on lap 65.
• Harvick told the team that the No. 29 was “pushing terrible on the start” of the run, and a couple laps later said it was “absolutely sideways.” Just before the caution flag waved at lap 83, Harvick told Martin that he needed a major adjustment on the next stop as he was really loose, so Martin called for a big air pressure adjustment on the lap 85 trip to pit road.
• The No. 29 Budweiser Chevrolet restarted from the 13th position on lap 88. Harvick was able to gain a few positions before the team made a green-flag pit stop at lap 128 for four tires, fuel and an air pressure adjustment as he told the team the car had been too tight.
• Harvick dropped back to 14th on the next run as the car’s handling became too loose before he came back to pit road during another round of green-flag stops at lap 168. On that stop, the No. 29 Budweiser pit crew changed four tires, added fuel and pulled a spring rubber from the right rear.
• The car was too tight for the first few laps after the stop and when the caution flag waved at lap 205 he told Gil that it was “tight to the center and loose everywhere else.”
• The team made a chassis adjustment and added tape to the grill at lap 206 and came back down pit road at lap 209 to top off the fuel tank in case the race stayed green for the rest of the way.
• Harvick restarted 14th and picked up one spot before the caution flag waved again on lap 219. The team opted to stay out and gain track position while most of the field hit pit road. Harvick restarted from the second position at lap 224. He was able to hold off some cars for a few laps, but dropped back to 10th by the time the caution flag waved at lap 239.
• Martin and Harvick discussed the problems they’d had with the car’s handling throughout the race and made the decision to get the car’s setup back to where they’d started the race out at, so the No. 29 Budweiser Chevrolet team made wholesale adjustments when Harvick brought the car down pit road at lap 241.
• He restarted from the 14th position at lap 244 and immediately took off toward the front. Just four laps into the run Harvick went four wide to take over the eighth position. At lap 264 he was up to sixth when the caution flag waved, setting the field up for a green-white-checkered finish.
• Harvick picked up a spot as the field took the green, but fell back to sixth coming to the checkered flag.
• Jimmie Johnson scored the win in Sunday’s race and Kasey Kahne, Brad Keselowski, Matt Kenseth and Carl Edwards completed the top five.
• With his fifth-place finish, Edwards took over the lead in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series driver point standings by one point over Harvick. Johnson, Keselowski and Kenseth round out the top five in the standings.
• Follow along each weekend with Harvick and the team on Twitter. Check out @KevinHarvick for behind-the-scenes information straight from the driver of the No. 29 Budweiser Chevrolet. Get live updates from the track each weekend from @Black29Car, the PR team for Harvick. Also, follow @RCRracing and @RCR29KHarvick for additional information about the Richard Childress Racing organization.
Harvick on the team’s run at Kansas Speedway: “It was a long day to say the least, but everyone on the Budweiser Chevy team just kept adjusting. Nothing seemed to work right today as far as our adjustments were going, so we kept swinging at it and that next to the last pit stop, we put four tires on and that helped us get through the traffic. I knew we were going to be close to the cut-off line there of when the guys would pit but the No. 22 (Kurt Busch) and I stayed out and everybody behind us pitted. Carl (Edwards) came with two tires there in the end, but all in all, it was a great save for everybody on the Budweiser Chevy team.”
The following is the finish position of the other beverage-sponsored cars participating in the Hollywood Casino 400:
• Kasey Kahne, driver of the No. 4 Red Bull Toyota, finished second.
• Brad Keselowski, driver of the No. 2 Miller Lite Dodge, finished third.
• Matt Kenseth and the No. 17 Crown Royal Ford team finished fourth.
• Dale Earnhardt Jr. and the No. 88 National Guard/AMP Energy Chevrolet team finished 14th.
• Brian Vickers and the No. 83 Red Bull Toyota team finished 19th.
• Mike Bliss and the No. 32 Street King Ford team finished 28th.
• Dave Blaney and the No. 36 Big Red Chevrolet team finished 31st.
• Reed Sorenson and the No. 7 SPEED Energy/MAPEI/Menards Dodge team finished 38th.
The following is the finish position of the other Richard Childress Racing teams participating in the Hollywood Casino 400:
• Clint Bowyer and the No. 33 Cheerios/Hamburger Helper Chevrolet finished seventh.
• Paul Menard, driver of the No. 27 Schrock/Menards Chevrolet, finished 12th.
• Jeff Burton and the No. 31 Caterpillar Chevrolet team finished 21st.
• Austin Dillon and the No. 98 President Ronald Reagan Centennial Chevrolet team finished 26th.
The next race for NASCAR Sprint Cup Series teams is Saturday night’s Bank of America 500 at Charlotte Motor Speedway. ABC will provide the TV broadcast of the only night race in the Chase starting with the pre-race show at 7 p.m. ET. PRN affiliates and Sirius XM NASCAR Radio will provide the radio coverage of the race.