Harvick scores road course win
WATKINS GLEN, N.Y. — Kevin Harvick hasn't had the results Jeff Gordon and Tony Stewart have had on NASCAR's road courses. That may be about to change.
Running in the top 10 from the start of the race Sunday at Watkins Glen International, Harvick did what few thought was possible: He passed Stewart for the lead with three laps to go and won his first road race.
"I was taught to never give up, and that's kind of the attitude that I work in — never quit and just roll over," said Harvick, who climbed past teammate Jeff Burton into third in the points. "I think it probably surprised everybody else that we were able to drive back by and win."
Since Stewart had won three of the four previous Cup races at The Glen and passed the No. 29 Goodwrench Chevy a few laps earlier, Harvick probably was right about his second victory of the year driving for resurgent Richard Childress Racing.
"I knew I was only going to have a couple of chances, so I took my chance, it stuck, and I went on by," said Harvick, who ranks third among active drivers at Watkins Glen with an average finish of eighth in six starts.
His winning pass was made coming out of the final curve of the 11-turn layout. Harvick outbraked Stewart through the hard right-hander, edged past on the front straightaway and completed the pass entering the first turn, a 90-degree right-hander. He then pulled away over the final laps.
"I think I just overdrove the entries and exits, and he was good," said Stewart, who moved up two spots to seventh in the points race.
The race was polesitter Kurt Busch's to lose, and his crew lost it for him. Just past midway of the 90-lap race, Joe Nemechek spun off course and brought out a caution for debris and Busch, following his crew's instructions, began to head for the pit entrance for tires and fuel. But just as his front tires were about to cross the commitment line, the green light turned red, signaling the pits were closed.
Unable to veer back onto the track, Busch made his stop, then was penalized and sent to the rear of the field on the restart as crew chief Roy McCauley kicked a tire in frustration. The same thing happened here to Jeff Gordon a year ago, and he suffered, too.
"Kurt, I don't know what to say. I'm about in tears," McCauley said over the radio. "I'm sorry, Kurt."
"I think I'm OK," Busch said.
He was, but not for long. Seconds after the race restarted, Busch was caught in a multicar crash. Busch's No. 2 Miller Lite Dodge sustained front-end damage, and his chances for victory vanished.
"We put ourselves in position for NASCAR to make a call, and it didn't end up in our favor," said Busch, who rallied into the top 10 again but spun out on the final lap and finished 19th.
The top 10 drivers in the standings qualify for the 10-race Chase for the championship. And Busch, 13th and fighting for the last spot with Greg Biffle, Kasey Kahne and Dale Earnhardt Jr., appeared set to make a big jump. Although Busch moved up to 12th, he dropped 172 points behind Earnhardt, who remained 10th after an 18th-place finish.
The top 10 will be reset in four weeks — after the 26th race of the season — into five-point intervals, and those 10 drivers will race for the Nextel Cup title over the final 10 races of the season.
Busch, fresh from his stirring victory over Robby Gordon in Saturday's Busch Series race, was the class of the field from the start, leading 36 of the first 53 laps after surviving a hard bump from Kahne on the first turn of the race.
Neither Jeff Gordon, Stewart, nor Robby Gordon, who combined to win 16 of the previous 18 races on NASCAR's two road courses, had anything for Busch in the first half of the 220.5-mile race.
"You feel for Kurt today," Stewart said. "He had a car that was capable of winning the race. That's absolutely rotten, terrible luck right there."
Harvick, who pitted just before the race-changing caution, gained the lead when Stewart and the rest of the leaders pitted the next time around.
"You're gambling on the caution," said Todd Berrier, Harvick's crew chief. "That's all you're doing. We would have liked to have stopped sooner."
