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Saturday, March 21, 2009

Harvick makes it happen at BMS.

He finally did it. Kevin Harvick proved just how strong KHI is on Saturday by winning the Nationwide Series race at Bristol Motor Speedway. Harvick led 44 laps in the Kevin Harvick Inc. owned Chevrolet. It was the first victory in a car fielded by the race team he built with his wife, Delana.

In Victory Lane,Delana Harvick said “It is very emotional, he’s tried so hard, so long in his own stuff. Today was his day.”

Sure, Harvick has won three times in the KHI truck(2002. 2003, and 2008), but he has never won a race in the Nationwide Series for his own team. Tony Stewart has won twice and Bobby Labonte once.

He had a clear shot to win after Kyle Busch was taken out of contention by a penalty on the final pit stop.

“It feels pretty good to get our car into Victory Lane,” Harvick said. “Finally we got this out of the way. Delana and I built this company from basically dirt. It started as a hobby. It’s been a tremendous amount of pressure that I’ve put on myself … but it was well worth the reward today.”

During the 300 mile lap, Harvick had to deal with an alternator failure, that made his cockpit extremely hot has he rolled to the checkered flag.

Both Carl Edwards and Clint Bowyer even came to Victory Lane to congratulate Kevin and Delana Harvick. Bowyer even went as fair as joke around with Kevin in VL.“It’s been a long time coming,” Bowyer said. “Obviously, Kevin is qualified to win races. I knew it was only a matter of time. But forget him, I’m bummed I didn’t win.”

Speaking of bummed, you can’t forget Kyle Busch. He lead 157 laps only to be taken out contention when his crew let a tire slip away during the final pit stop. NASCAR Officials sent Busch to the tail end of the longest line as his punishment. He was 14th on the restart with 41 laps to go.

“Ahhh, man, that’s frustrating,” Edwards said of Busch’s penalty.

“Was he mad?” Bowyer deadpanned.

Was he ever.

Even though he diminished 6th, Busch appeared furious after the race. He stopped his car in Turn 3 and walked directly to the pedestrian tunnel to leave the track. Not before he through his HANS and earplugs.

Carl Edwards lead in the Nationwide Standings was stretched to 114 points over Harvick and 124 over Busch, who still gained two spots in the standings despite the setback.

Top 10:
1. Kevin Harvick
2. Carl Edwards
3. Clint Bowyer
4. Matt Kenseth
5. Justin Allgaier(Rookie of the Race)
6.Kyle Busch
7. Steve Wallace
8. Scott Speed
9. Joey Logano
10. Jason Leffler

Other Notables:
12. Brad Keselowski
14. Kenny Wallace
19. David Ragan
21. Brendan Gaughan(Pole Winner)

The next race for the NASCAR Nationwide Series is April 4th at Texas Motor Speedway. Coverage begins at 2:30pm/eastern time on ESPN2.

2 comments:

Genna said...

Ohhh girly what a day it was huh? =)

Kristin Weaver said...

It sure was. A day with Kyle having problems is a good day. Hehe!