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Kevin Harvick No. 4 Budweiser Chevrolet Event Preview: Kansas

Pre-Race Reports | NASCAR Cup Series | 10/14/15

The King of Beers Reigns in Kansas City

KANNAPOLIS, N.C. (Oct. 14, 2015) – Kansas City is a town where sports teams are considered royalty. The city’s home teams have drawn their names from leaders of all kinds, starting with the Kansas City Royals, who are currently competing in the Major League Baseball playoffs, and the National Football League’s Kansas City Chiefs. And the practice dates as far back as the Kansas City Monarchs of the Negro National League, and the former Kansas City Kings of the National Basketball Association.

This weekend, Kevin Harvick will bring his No. 4 Budweiser/Jimmy John’s Chevrolet to Kansas Speedway in Kansas City for Sunday’s Hollywood Casino 400 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race with the “King of Beers” on the hood as the reigning Sprint Cup champion continues the defend of his 2014 crown.

Harvick’s 2015 campaign has made him the favorite to retain his title with only six races remaining in the Sprint Cup playoffs. He heads to Kansas ranked second in the Contender Round on the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup grid, 13 points above the cutoff line to advance to the Eliminator Round of eight drivers.

Thirty races into this season, Harvick has been a model of consistency with three wins and leads the series with 11 second-place finishes, 20 top-fives and 24 top-10s. He’s also led a series-high 2,031 laps with an average finish of 8.9.

Harvick is the first driver to lead 2,000 laps in consecutive seasons since Jeff Gordon in 1995 and 1996. The last three drivers to lead more than 2,000 laps in a single season have all gone on to win the Sprint Cup championship – Jeff Gordon led 2,320 laps in 2001, Jimmie Johnson led 2,238 laps in 2009 and Harvick led 2,137 in 2014.

After placing second last Sunday at Charlotte (N.C.) Motor Speedway, Harvick became the 13th driver since 1972 to collect 20 top-five finishes in a season. The others include: Bobby Allison, Richard Petty, Cale Yarborough, Benny Parsons, Darrell Waltrip, Dale Earnhardt, Jeff Gordon, Terry Labonte, Dale Jarrett, Bobby Labonte and Jimmie Johnson.

The runner-up finish was also Harvick’s 11th of the season, the most since Bobby Allison logged 12 runner-up finishes in 1972. The No. 4 Chevrolet driver boasts 14 top-two finishes this season, double the total of the next-best drivers in that category – Kyle Busch and Johnson, who each have seven.

The reigning Sprint Cup champion leads several other statistical categories: 119.3 driver rating, 42 bonus points, 1,218 fastest laps run, 31.7 percent of fastest laps run, 23.5 percent of laps led, 2,460 miles led, 7,856 laps in the top-15 and average running position of 7.482.

In 2015, the Bakersfield, California native led the 26-race regular season with 978 points prior to the Chase driver standings reset following the 26th round at Richmond (Va.) International Raceway. Harvick’s point total through the first 26 races was the most under the current system that came into effect in 2011, surpassing the 914 regular-season points scored by Greg Biffle in 2012 and Jeff Gordon in 2014.

Harvick and the No. 4 team have reason for optimism as the series returns to Kansas for the second race of the three-race Contender Round of the Chase. Harvick has scored 512 points in the last 10 races at the 1.5-mile oval – more than any other driver. He also has one win, four top-five finishes and six top-10s with an average finish of 6.6 and 387 laps led. In 19 career Sprint Cup starts at Kansas, he has the second-best average finish of 9.4.

The reigning champions are hoping to continue their dominance in the Contender Round with a win at Kansas Speedway that would automatically advance the team to the Eliminator Round.

KEVIN HARVICK, Driver of the No. 4 Budweiser/Jimmy John’s Chevrolet SS for Stewart-Haas Racing:

How do you view this weekend’s race at Kansas Speedway?

“I view Kansas as an opportunity, just for the fact of how well we’ve run there over the last two years. We had a great test at Kansas and we felt like we learned a bunch of things that we could immediately apply to a lot of the different racetracks. I think that test has shown up in the performance of the cars. As you look at Kansas, I think the test has applied to what we did at Charlotte and should give us a great starting point for when we get to Kansas to take care of a lot of the characteristics that we already worked through during the test. I’m definitely looking forward to Kansas, for sure.”

How is your experience from the first round of the Chase going to make you better in this round?

“I think as you look at last year, this team dealt with building a new race team and a lot of adversity through the year with a lot of situations that could have torn things apart in a lot of other places, but everybody believed in each other. The one common denominator that we had in all of these situations is really fast race cars. So, in the end, you can make things happen when the car is running like it does and I think that is really what has held everything together – everybody sees the potential and the performance that we have on the racetrack and there is no reason to try and beat that down. We want to make that better. Being in a down situation is only going to make things worse, so we try to avoid those situations and move on as fast as we can.”

Chassis Information: Chassis No. 4-899: Kevin Harvick will pilot the No. 4 Budweiser/Jimmy John’s Chevrolet SS built on Chassis No. 4-899 in the Hollywood Casino 400 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race Sunday at Kansas Speedway in Kansas City. Built in 2014, Chassis No. 4-899 made its debut last September at Chicagoland Speedway in Joliet, Illinois, where it started sixth, led 79 laps and finished fifth. It also served as a backup at Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth and Homestead-Miami Speedway at the end of 2014. Chassis No. 4-899 made its 2015 debut at Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway in April, where it started fourth, led 184 laps and finished 38th after being collected in an accident. It also raced at both Sprint Cup races at New Hampshire Motor Speedway in Loudon in 2015. In July, Harvick started 12th, led 59 laps and finished third in Loudon. He started second at Loudon in September, led 216 laps, but ran out of fuel with less than three laps to go and finished 21st. 

Kansas Speedway Notes of Interest:

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