Budweiser Racing Team Notes of Interest
• Following the first off weekend of the season, Kevin Harvick and the No. 29 Budweiser Chevrolet team travel to Fort Worth, Texas, for Saturday night’s Samsung Mobile 500 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series (NSCS) race at Texas Motor Speedway.
• Media Availability… Harvick will be available to members of the media at 3:30 p.m. CT on Thursday in the Texas Motor Speedway infield media center’s deadline room.
• Solid Start for Harvick… As NSCS teams embark upon the seventh race of the season, Harvick is off to one of the strongest starts in his career. In the first six races this year he’s earned a career-best average starting position of 7.83. His 9.0 average finish at this point of the season is the second-highest of Harvick’s NSCS career. His average finish six races into 2008 was 7.83.
• Chassis Info… The No. 29 Budweiser Chevrolet team will utilize Chassis No. 391 from the Richard Childress Racing (RCR) stable. Harvick scored an 11th-place finish in the car last month at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
• Statistically Speaking… Harvick has made 18 NSCS starts at Texas Motor Speedway since 2001. During that time he has scored three top-fives and eight top-10 finishes. He has completed 99.8 percent of the laps run in that time (6,008 of 6,022) and he’s led just five laps at the track. Harvick holds an average starting position of 21.0 and an average finish of 12.9 at Texas.
• Loop Data… Since the inception of NASCAR’s Loop Data Statistics in 2006, Harvick has competed in 14 NSCS races at Texas Motor Speedway and owns a couple impressive marks heading into this weekend’s event, including: first in Closers, having gained 29 positions in the last 10 percent of the races in that span; and fourth in Green-Flag Passes (1,030). In addition, Harvick ranked first in Quality Passes (82) in the fall event at the speedway.
• Looking Back… In last year’s Samsung Mobile 500, Harvick and the No. 29 Budweiser Chevrolet team scored a 20th-place finish after struggling with handling problems for much of the race. In the fall race at the track he took home a 13th-place result.
• Ten-Gallon Hat… While Harvick has yet to don a cowboy hat in Victory Lane in NSCS competition at Texas Motor Speedway, he has had the honor of wearing one four times in NASCAR Nationwide Series (NNS) competition (March 2001; and November 2005, 2006 and 2007) and once in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series (November 2011). Harvick’s NNS wins at Texas in 2006 and 2007 were under the leadership of crew chief Shane Wilson, who now serves in the same capacity on the No. 29 Budweiser Chevrolet team.
• In the Rearview Mirror… Harvick and the No. 29 Budweiser team started second and led the first 21 laps before handling issues dropped them back to a 19th-place finish two weekends ago at Martinsville Speedway.
• For the online version of the Budweiser Racing media guide, please visit http://www.budracingmedia.com.
• 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. Fans can also interact with Harvick on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/OfficialKevinHarvick.
Kevin Harvick discusses Texas Motor Speedway:
Your team has been fairly solid so far this year. Do you feel like you guys can take it to the next level and get a top-five or even have a chance to win at Texas Motor Speedway? “Texas was probably the worst track for us last year. We struggled with what we needed to get in the car to be able to have speed and race well. We’re going there with a different mindset this year to try to get some speed out of the car. In Las Vegas we had a lot of speed, so our first mile-and-a-half race went really well and hopefully when we get to Texas we can have it all together.”
What are the keys to running well at Texas Motor Speedway? “Texas is a really fast race track, especially for qualifying. I think it’s probably the fastest race track we go to. If you’re going to qualify well or win the race, you’re going to have to have a car that’s comfortable to drive with a lot of throttle time.”
From the driver’s standpoint, can you feel the speed at Texas Motor Speedway? “(Texas) is a really fast race track and the banking is where you can really feel how fast you are going. It’s one of those few race tracks where you feel the speed in the car. The unique part about this race track is that you have that big speed for about three or four laps and as you go through the tire run the speed really drops off a tremendous amount. But from a driver standpoint you have a lot of options and the race track has a lot of bumps, which adds character. You have to make your car work good and you have to get up off Turn 2, but you can run all over the race track. Obviously we’ll run the bottom for qualifying, but when race time comes we will be moving around all over the place so it’s fun from a driver’s standpoint.”