Harvick Finishes 31st in Daytona 500

Race Winner: Austin Dillon of Richard Childress Racing (Chevrolet) in overtime

Stage 1 Winner: Kurt Busch of Stewart-Haas Racing (Ford)

Stage 2 Winner: Ryan Blaney of Team Penske (Ford)

 

Stage 1 Recap (Laps 1-60):

Started sixth, finished seventh, and collected four bonus points.

● The Jimmy John’s team surrendered the seventh position to pit road under caution on lap 52 for four tires and fuel.

● The No. 4 Ford restarted 13th with five laps remaining in the stage.

● Harvick narrowly avoided an accident at the conclusion of the stage to jump from 15th up to seventh.

The team came to pit road for four tires and fuel at the conclusion of Stage 1.

 

Stage 2 Recap (Laps 61-120):

Started third and finished 31st.

● Harvick raced in the top-five the majority of the stage.

● The Jimmy John’s team came to pit road from the fourth position for two tires, air pressure adjustments and fuel on lap 94.

● Harvick restarted fourth on lap 98 but was collected in a multicar incident on lap 102.

● The No. 4 car suffered heavy damage during the lap-102 incident, causing the team to make extensive repairs on pit road.

The team was unable to complete repairs on pit road and was forced to retire from the event on lap 105.

 

Notes:

● Harvick scored nine bonus points in Duel 2 and four points in Stage 1.

● There were eight caution periods for a total of 37 laps.

● Only 10 of the 40 drivers in the Daytona 500 finished on the lead lap.

● Austin Dillon won the Daytona 500 to score his second career Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series victory and his first at Daytona. His margin of victory over runner-up Darrell (Bubba) Wallace Jr. was .26 of a second.

 

Kevin Harvick, driver of the No. 4 Jimmy John’s Ford Fusion for Stewart-Haas Racing:

Your thoughts on the incident and the team’s effort to get the car back out? “They did a good job fixing the car. The car was fine. Apparently, you have to have the door. I thought it was just the door foam, but you’ve got to have some metal on the outside of the door. All in all, they did a good job fixing our Jimmy John’s/Busch Beer Ford. We were just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Two guys, I couldn’t tell. It looked to me like there was one too many blocks, and the blocking car wound up spinning out and the 2 car hit the 24 and wound up coming up the racetrack into me. It was like a can opener on the way by.”

 

Next Up:

The next event on the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series schedule is the Folds of Honor 500 on Sunday, Feb. 25 at Atlanta Motor Speedway. The race starts at 2 p.m. EST with live coverage provided by FOX beginning with its prerace show at 1:30 p.m.

 

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