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Hunt Brothers Pizza Driver Scored Fifth Top-Five Finish of 2017 XFINITY Series Season

Date: Sept. 2, 2017

Event: Sport Clips VFW 200 (Round 24 of 33)

Series: NASCAR XFINITY Series

Location: Darlington (S.C.) Raceway (1.366-mile, egg-shaped oval)

Format: 147 laps, broken into three stages (45 laps/45 laps/57 laps)

Start/Finish: 2nd/3rd (Running, completed 148 of 148 laps)

 

Race Winner: Denny Hamlin of Joe Gibbs Racing (Toyota) in overtime

Stage 1 Winner: Kevin Harvick of Stewart-Haas Racing (Ford)

Stage 2 Winner: Kevin Harvick of Stewart-Haas Racing (Ford)

 

Stage 1 Recap (Ends on Lap 45):

• Started second, finished first.
• Harvick narrowly escaped an early caution on lap nine as Ty Dillon spun directly in front of him.
• The Hunt Brothers Pizza team raced to the lead on lap 29 and opted to stay out on lap 32 under caution to retain the lead.
• Harvick came to pit road for four tires and fuel at the conclusion of Stage 1.

Stage 2 Recap (Ends on Lap 90):  

• Started third, finished first.
• Harvick kept the No. 41 Hunt Brothers Pizza Ford on the track under caution on lap 74 while racing in the second position.
• He took the lead on the following restart and kept it for the remainder of the stage.
• Harvick came to pit road for four tires and fuel at the conclusion of Stage 2.

Final Stage Recap (Ends on Lap 147):        

• Started second, finished third.
• Harvick stayed out under caution on lap 100 to maintain the second position.
• The Hunt Brothers Pizza Ford passed Joey Logano for the lead on lap 118.
• Harvick came to pit road as the leader for four tires, fuel and an air pressure adjustment under caution on lap 138.
• Joey Logano, who had pit stall one, beat Harvick off of pit road forcing him to restart on the bottom.
• Harvick dropped to the fifth position by the following caution on lap 143, but rallied on the following restart to finish third.

Notes:                   

• Harvick scored his fifth top-five finish of the 2017 XFINITY Series Season
• The Hunt Brothers Pizza driver scored his third top-five finish in 15 NASCAR XFINITY Series starts at Darlington.
• It is his 182nd top-five finish in 341 XFINITY Series starts.
• Harvick led three times for 54 laps.
• This is Harvick’s sixth XFINITY Series start for Stewart-Haas Racing.
• The race featured 11 lead changes among five drivers and nine cautions for 33 laps.
• Denny Hamlin won the Sport Clips VFW 200 to score his 17th career XFINITY Series victory, second of the 2017 season and fifth at Darlington Raceway. His margin of victory over second-place Joey Logano was .185 of a second.

Kevin Harvick, driver of the No. 41 Hunt Brothers Pizza Ford Mustang for Stewart-Haas Racing:

“We had a great Hunt Brothers Ford. I want to thank Hunt Brothers and Fields and Bad Boy Off Road, Ford, Morton Buildings, everybody from Stewart-Haas Racing and Haas Automation for just letting us run this thing. It just didn’t wind up working out there at the end. I wound up on the bottom and I kept my foot in it over there, got loose underneath the No. 20. We weren’t the strongest for five or 10 laps and that didn’t really work out with that short run there at the end and we got stuck on the bottom. We got loose and then we got freight-trained, but just a great car.  It wound up being a great race and that’s all you can ask for.”

Next Up:

The next event on the NASCAR XFINITY Series schedule is the Virginia529 College Savings 250 on Friday, Sept. 8 at Richmond (Va.) International Raceway. The race starts at 7:30 p.m. EDT with live coverage provided by NBCSN. Darlington marked the conclusion of Harvick’s XFINITY Series schedule for the 2017 season.

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