Kevin Harvick didn’t have the quickest car at Daytona and struggled against an overheating problem that dropped him back into the murkier zones of the whirling dervish pack, but what he did have was the right move up his sleeve at the crucial moment.
He grasped American racing’s biggest prize away from one of its best-loved racers, Mark Martin, in brilliant – yet controversial – style.
Harvick’s sensational final lap move dashed the dreams of Martin, the now part-time Cup veteran who once again had to settle for being the bridesmaid. He’s never won this race, or the championship, but Martin put himself in a position to win after gambling on taking only two tires in his final pitstop.
He always looked prone to attack from constant challenger Kyle Busch’s Hendrick Chevrolet, which had taken fresh rubber all-round, but his true opposition was coming from much further back in the field.
Busch had moved ominously into second place as the race entered its endgame, and was challenging Martin for the lead with four laps remaining when a multi-car accident caused a red flag, leading to a two-lap green/white-checkered race to the flag.
“We can win this thing,” Martin told his crew over the radio as he sat waiting for the restart, while Busch’s crew chief Alan Gustafson pointed out bluntly to his charge: “We’ve got four new tires; he’s only got two.”
Having led briefly in the first half of the race, Harvick appeared to be out of the frame after his car received a bang on its nose that sent the water temperatures sky high. Fortunately, the team was able to rectify its cooling duct in a pitstop, and from 29th with 22 laps to go, he rallied his way back into seventh place for the crucial restart.
The racing had been positively restrained by NASCAR restrictor plate racing standards, but it was just about to get a whole lot wilder. As the evening turned to twilight, and with the ultimate bragging rights of the year at stake, as one driver put it: “The risk versus reward ratio changes and people do things they wouldn’t normally do.” Or, as Harvick put it: “A bunch of demons came out when it got dark.”
As the crowd took to their feet, Martin made a solid getaway and hugged the yellow line at the bottom of the track forcing Busch to follow him as the pack built its precious momentum, hamstrung by their strangled engines. Further back, Harvick was the aggressor, but his first move to the outside on the back straight only gained him one place, so it seemed a top five finish was his only realistic target.
On the final lap, however, Martin was busy blocking Busch going into Turn 3, while Harvick again opted for the high line. This time, he got a mega bump draft from a combination of Matt Kenseth and Jeff Burton, and they “pushed the hell out of me” to help him rocket past Elliott Sadler, David Gilliand and Greg Biffle on the back straight.
As he approached Turn 3, Harvick also roared past Busch – who tried to block but couldn’t cope with Kevin’s “freight-train” momentum.
Unbelievably, Harvick then drew level with Martin going into the final yards and edged ahead exiting Turn 4, with just inches separating them as they raced to the line. Behind them, a huge accident kicked off as the chasing pack self-destructed, but the front two kept it clean as they dipped for the line.
Here’s where the controversy arose, as NASCAR no longer allows the practice of racing back to the finish line if there’s a crash. But this is the Daytona 500, and as Martin would shrug later: “NASCAR did its best to get an exciting finish – it’s never over until it’s over.”
NASCAR insisted that the yellow was called, but only when Clint Bowyer began his alarming somersault, and not for the initial crash instigated by a spinning Busch. The sanctioning body maintained that Harvick had already crossed the finish line at that point, although many took issue with its stance.
The winning margin was 0.02secs, which was the closest finish in the Daytona 500’s history at the time – although they only timed it accurately since 1993, and took three days to decide the winner of the first one.
Martin said of the situation: “I was leading when they were wrecking. I noticed the smoke in my mirrors, but my focus was on beating the 29 [Harvick] to the finish line, and I thought had Kyle behind me. But I’d lost Kyle, so I was hoping for a push but there was nobody there. It was looking good, but I let it slip through my fingers and I’m fine with that. I’m not going to cry over it.”
Harvick said of the grandstand finish: “I saw the yellow come out right after we crossed the finish line. I don’t really know when it came out, but I was concentrating on Mark because I was in front of him but he side-drafted as we came off Turn 4, so I knew it would be close.”
What Martin really needed was the benefit of push from behind, but the most likely provider, Busch, wasn’t there because he was spinning like a top exiting Turn 4. This triggered a huge crash as Matt Kenseth spun in sympathy, provoking Casey Mears, Sterling Marlin (who managed to slam into the pitwall), Jeff Gordon, David Stremme and last, but certainly not least, Bowyer to crash. He would cross the finish line upside down and on fire, but quickly hopped out as the flames licked around his windscreen.
“I saw them all wreck and thought I was clear,” said Bowyer. “Then somebody clipped me and turned me over. I wrecked the race car; it’s pretty much junk. Oh well.”
The man with the strongest car in the race was Tony Stewart. The winner of the Bud Shootout and a Gatorade Duel 150 qualifier looked on course for his first Daytona 500 victory – this despite running over debris while leading, getting stuck behind a spinning car in the pitlane and then getting caught speeding as he left the pits.
From 40th position on lap 80, Stewart was back at the front with 50 laps to go. But just after he got there, he ran too low in Turn 4, got into a slide and was collected twice by a close following Kurt Busch (who probably the second-best car in the event) sending both into the wall and out of a race either could have won.
“I mishandled in the corner and the car just took off on me,” said Stewart, whose days of petulant rants seem a thing of the past. “It was pretty impressive to come back to the front after going all the way to the back, though.”
Busch shouldered the blame for the crash, although it didn’t seem to be his fault: “We were both taken out of the Daytona 500 because of my mistake. We were poised for a good run at the end, but got bottled up in that turn.”
With that duo out of the way, Martin Truex took over at the front as the race entered its final quarter, under pressure from Kenseth and Martin. Kenseth grabbed the lead with a smart pass leading up to the crucial yellow period during which Martin took his two-tire gamble to gain track position. Although he would play a major role in Harvick’s win, Kenseth went unrewarded after his last-gasp rotation.
But he wasn’t the only hard luck story. After the Busch brothers had looked so strong earlier, it was harsh that neither of them would score the finish they deserved. Kyle’s last-lap block attempt on Harvick meant he was very tight to the bottom of the track and he suddenly spun out of third place exiting that fateful last corner, triggering the ‘big one’ that had taken so long in coming.
It also eliminated Biffle from the leading places, who had a prime view of what happened but could still only surmise that “Kyle got loose and we all wrecked”.
There were some good fortune stories to be found from this race, however, as Jeff Burton emerged through the chaos to grab an unexpected third. “The last 40 laps were insane. I had my eyes closed the whole time after the restart! I had a great seat for the wreck as we came off Turn 4, it got really wild.”
Burton deserved his slice of luck, as he dropped back from second place with 70 laps to go due to a slow pitstop, caused by his jackman tearing his calf muscle as he ran around the car. “I saw him literally hopping around the car, still carrying the jack,” said Burton. “I’m really proud of him for doing that.”
An even more unlikely top five finisher was Mike Wallace, who only made the main event via the qualifying races. His plucky underdog run was rewarded with fourth as much bigger names contrived to eliminate each other.
The top rookie was fifth placed David Ragan, the youngster that Jack Roush has chosen to replace Martin. He had only raced into the top 10 in the closing stages before dodging the bullets of the last lap crashfest, having started the penultimate lap back in 15th.
Behind Ragan were the Evernham-run Dodges of Elliott Sadler and Kasey Kahne – not bad considering their crew chiefs had been banned for cheating in qualifying – and poleman David Gilliland, who led for 18 laps but lost a lap when he collided with Robby Gordon in the pits. Joe Nemechek and Jeff Gordon rounded out the top 10 but bore the scars of battle.
Juan Pablo Montoya finished his first Daytona 500 in 19th place, getting back on the lead lap after struggling with handling issues and a transmission that only offered second and fourth gears by the end. “A top 20 finish is kind of what I wanted to do here,” he said.
Other pre-race favourites fell by the wayside. Fan favourite Dale Earnhardt Jr endured a day that had more downs than ups, and he was eventually taken out in a pile-up that was triggered by Jamie McMurray. Earnhardt rammed front row starter Ricky Rudd in the melee that followed, but admitted: “It’s very frustrating to make things happen when the car won’t cooperate. I couldn’t see what caused the wreck but Rudd slowed down and I got into him.”
2006 Daytona 500 winner Jimmie Johnson looked like an accident waiting to happen at Turn 2 all day, and he delivered with 26 laps remaining. Unable to avoid the fallout were Denny Hamlin, Jeff Green and David Reutimann.
To complete Penske’s misery, Kurt Busch’s team-mate Ryan Newman dropped out with a blown engine, legacy of a holed radiator, incurred soon after he’d led a lap.
Toyota’s arrival at the top level of stock car racing was a damp squib. Dale Jarrett finished on the lead lap in 22nd, with Michael Waltrip two laps down in 30th.
In fact, the most remarkable aspect of its debut was Dave Blaney, who avoided a collision between Reed Sorenson and Carl Edwards exiting Turn 4 by driving down the pitlane, but he rejoined at almost full speed, complete with a blown right-front tire, and was slammed into by Ken Schrader’s Ford. Blaney was given a five-lap penalty for the maneuver, but his car was too badly damaged to continue anyway.
After a week where cheating in qualifying had made headline news across America, it was fitting Daytona provided a thrilling finale. As a poignant postscript, Harvick’s win was the first Daytona 500 success for Richard Childress Racing since the late Dale Earnhardt’s sole victory in 1998.
After the race, an emotional Childress said: “It gives me thoughts back to ’98 and I’m going to cherish this. Winning tonight is great, but I don’t think anything will replace a friend, Dale Earnhardt, a great American racing driver.”
On the subject of the race itself, Childress added: “It was unbelievable to see the moves that Kevin made. I told Kevin I kept my eyes shut because it was so wild!”
And the violence didn’t stop there. Harvick’s victory celebration also got out of hand: “I guess I didn’t realized how excited I was and punched the dang mirror out of the car! That really hurt my hand.”
It didn’t stop him celebrating a remarkable race win, as Martin left the track with that familiar second place feeling.
