2014 Sprint Cup Chase: A Pit Crew Change Is the Answer for Kevin Harvick
The headline this week was predictable.
Pit Crew Swap Between Nos. 4 and 14 Teams.
You could see the swap coming weeks ago.
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Time after time this season, the Stewart-Haas Racing driver has seen a victory slip away because of a miscue on pit road. Everything from a loose wheel at the Coca-Cola 600 to a pit road speeding penalty at the Bristol night race.
Even Kevin Harvick himself took the blame for a miscue at Kansas by admitting he was driving too slowly down pit road and the slow stop cost the team a win.
He’s talked about the pit road issue after nearly every race this season. Happy Harvick wasn’t so happy.
After finishing a solid fifth at Richmond last weekend (he was the only driver other than race winner Brad Keselowski to lead a lap) it was definitely on his mind.
“Our cars are really fast. I feel like we’ve overcome a lot of problems. We’ve gone 26 weeks and haven’t fixed pit road. We have to fix pit road in order to win a championship.”
His run for the title was locked up 25 weeks earlier, when a win at Phoenix had taken the pressure off.
It was a positive for Harvick’s team. His was a new team, formed when Harvick came to drive for his old friend Tony Stewart’s organization after 13 frustrating seasons at Richard Childress Racing. Those years with Childress were marked with close-but-no-cigar moments, as Harvick could get himself into the Chase, but for one reason or another, he could never seal the deal.
Three times he has finished third in the championship.
One day, Harvick looks at the calendar and realizes he’s 38 years old and he’s not yet won that elusive Sprint Cup title to go along with his two Nationwide championships and wins in the Daytona 500 (2007), Brickyard 400 (2003) and Coke 600 (2011, '13).
So, after numerous clashes with competitors, crew chiefs and eventually Childress himself, Harvick took out his frustration on the boss’ grandkids after a truck race at Martinsville last year—remember the "they had everything fed to them with a spoon" moment? He’d worn out his welcome at RCR.
The move to Stewart-Haas Racing would be his moment. He would get the best of everything and hopefully, along with it, a Sprint Cup title.
Along with a new team, this is a new Harvick. He has mellowed. A decade ago, his temper often got him into trouble. It’s how he gained (as a joke) the nickname “Happy.” His suspension from a Cup race in 2002, after losing his cool following a truck series race, is a long forgotten memory for most.
He’s nearly 40 years old now, and with it comes a natural maturity that just seems to work.
Gone are the years of stress while owning a race team. He and wife DeLana were kept so busy they didn’t have the time to enjoy life.
There’s a new focus—family.
Two years ago he and wife DeLana brought a son, Keelan, into the world. He’s shown that he's comfortable with playing the role of a great father. It fits him.
The win at Phoenix in February, at the second race of the 2014 season, was especially important when his team ran into problems that began the following week.
Beginning at Las Vegas, Harvick went through a period of bad luck. A wheel failure at Vegas, a failed oil line at Bristol, a blown tire at Fontana and transmission issues at Texas resulted in finishes of 41st, 39th, 36th and 42nd, respectively.
In the midst of those struggles, Harvick surprisingly kept his cool and stayed positive. He already had his ticket to the postseason.
Then, came Darlington and the nightmare ended. A pole and a win there and once again, he was Happy Harvick.
After that race, his second win of the season, it was as if the weight of the world had been lifted, and there was a reassurance that this team could win races.
"We have been fast every week,” said Harvick in a post-race interview. “You just have to battle through it. There is nothing that you can change about it. I think if we were in the previous points format you would probably be in a whole lot worse mood about it. But since we have already won and obviously we feel like we have given away some wins with the failures, but you just keep going about your business."
So, does a swap of pit road crews fix the problem?
It will in Harvick’s mind because every time he comes onto pit road this weekend in the opening round of the Chase, he will at the very least have regained some of the confidence lost long ago by his pit crew’s performance during those critical dozen seconds in the pit box—when a race can be won or lost.
The pit crew swap is the missing piece to the championship puzzle for Harvick. His Rodney Childers-led squad has been championship caliber for the second half of the season.
The Sporting News' Bob Pockrass reports that the decision to swap crews "was a team decision" according to Harvick.
His approach to the Chase opener is a conservative one. He says three decent races and then you move on to the next round.
"Obviously there's a lot of cars in the first round,” said Harvick in a pre-race media release. “For us, we kind of took the approach to take a Chicago test and try to have that carry through the other mile-and-a-half tracks, so hopefully that carries over.”
These days you can usually catch Harvick smiling on pit road with his wife and son alongside him.
This weekend that smile will be especially large, now that the pit road issues are a thing of the past.
All quotes are taken from official NASCAR, team and manufacturer media releases unless otherwise stated.
Bob Margolis is a member of the National Motorsports Press Association and has covered NASCAR, IndyCar, the NHRA and Sports Cars for more than two decades as a writer, television producer and on-air talent.
On Twitter: @BobMargolis
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