Kevin Harvick celebrates after winning the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Big Machine Vodka 400 at the Brickyard at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. [Brian Lawdermilk/Getty Images]
By Dan Margetta
Speedway, Ind., Sept. 8— Kevin Harvick made a strong statement as the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series heads into its playoff season as he won his second Big Machine Vodka 400 at the Brickyard in dominating fashion Sunday afternoon at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
Harvick, who led five times for 118 of the 160 laps in the race, grabbed the lead for good by fending off Joey Logano on a restart with less than ten laps to go and drove away to a six second victory.
Kevin Harvick leads the field during the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Big Machine Vodka 400 at the Brickyard at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. [Brian Lawdermilk/Getty Images]
“I can’t tell you how much coming to Indianapolis means to me,” Harvick told the crowd as he climbed from his car on the famed row of bricks at the start-finish line, “As a kid I watched Rick Mears win Indy 500’s and he was my hero so this is pretty awesome.”
“The guys on this race team built a heck of a race car and this is the same stuff we took to Michigan and went to victory lane there so to come here to the Brickyard and win, I know how much this means to the guys that work on this car because we’ve been so close to winning here before.”
“I don’t know if we had the best car but we had the fastest car,” Harvick continued as he described a key moment in the race when a lap 130 caution flag for a Kyle Larson crash in turn two waved just as he made his final pit stop, “We gave up the lead there on one of the restarts and then we came and pitted and the caution came out and it worked our way. The way that caution flag fell actually worked in our favor and it gave us control of the race.”
Logano, who won the first stage and led the race twice for a total of 11 laps, made a valiant effort to challenge Harvick for the top spot on the final restart as he remained alongside all the way down the backstretch until Harvick eventually edged ahead in between turns three and four. From there all Logano could do was watch Harvick pull away and he had to settle for a second place finish while Bubba Wallace provided the days “Cinderella story” as he drove the #43 Richard Petty Motorsports ride to a stout third place finish.
“The top line was definitely an advantage and I was able to hang with him and I thought I could pull him back enough down the backstretch and have a shot at this thing,” Logano said,” If I could get in front of him nobody was going to pass anybody but I didn’t get in front of him so we finished second.”
“It was a good day and we needed this,” an excited Wallace stated afterwards, “We unloaded with speed and I was bragging we would be kissing soe bricks on Sunday and we were just shy of it, it’s incredible to think about.”
“We’ve been bringing some heat and it’s just the passion and drive my team has,” Wallace continued, “It’s a blast coming to the racetrack with these guys and with smaller teams, you’re more like family so this means a lot and it’s an unforgettable day here in Indy.”
William Byron drove to a fourth place finish and Clint Bowyer finished fifth to lock down one of the remaining playoff spots. Denny Hamlin started a back-up car from the tail of the field due to a crash in practice and drove to a sixth place finish ahead of Ryan Blaney in seventh. Ryan Newman’s eighth place finish was enough to secure the final playoff position by four points over Daniel Suarez while Chase Elliott and Paul Menard both rebounded from earlier incidents to round out the top ten finishers. Suarez finished eleventh and was the first driver to miss the playoff cut.
The 2019 Playoff field: Ryan Newman, Kyle Larson, Erik Jones, William Byron, Martin Truex Jr, Clint Bowyer, Ryan Blaney, Chase Elliott, Denny Hamlin, Alex Bowman, Kurt Busch, Kyle Busch, Joey Logano, Brad Keselowski, Kevin Harvick, and Aric Almirola. [Brian Lawdermilk/Getty Images]
Fourteen of the Sixteen playoff positions were set coming into the race which left Bowyer, Newman, Suarez, and Jimmie Johnson to battle for the remaining two slots and Johnson made a strong attempt to continue his fifteen year streak of making the playoff field as he led four laps before hitting the turn one wall while battling for position on lap 106. The incident also involved several other vehicles including Kurt Busch and meant that Johnson would fail to make NASCAR’s playoffs for the first time in its sixteen year existence.
“Unfortunately we had a bad 25 races that led to the position we were in and we needed to have a stellar day,” Johnson said, “We were having a strong day and the 1 car (Kurt Busch) had a little trouble on the restart and I was on the inside going into the corner and it was just super tight. I couldn’t go anywhere below the white line and got turned around. This team is getting stronger every week and we’ll just dust ourselves off and go to Vegas and try to get a trophy.”
The Big Machine Vodka 400 at the Brickyard was the final race of the Monster Energy Cup Series regular season with the playoffs set to begin next weekend at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway and Kyle Busch topped the regular season point standings. That was little consolation to Busch however as his strong early run at Indianapolis came to a premature ending when he exited the race with flames shooting from his car due to an engine failure which left him with a 37th place finish.
The race was slowed a total of nine times under the caution flag with six of those for on-track incidents, one of which involved contenders Erik Jones and Brad Keselowski which constituted a twelve minute red flag at the conclusion of the event’s second stage. Jones’ car broke loose while underneath Keselowski in turn two which sent Jones hard into the wall and Keselowski across the track where he became wedged on top of a tire barrier. The red flag was necessary to repair the wall area around the tire barrier as both drivers emerged from their vehicles uninjured.
“We had new tires and we were racing some cars that didn’t have new tires and I went to make a pass there and got real tight to the 48 car (Jimmie Johnson) and lost the air on the nose,” Keselowski explained, “I was trying to leave room and I probably came down on Erik (Jones) just a little bit more than I thought I did and he got loose. I’m glad I’m OK and it was just a tough day for everyone on this team.”
“It was really challenging and that’s why I was making a move and being aggressive with it and just trying to get track position,” Jones stated, “We had a good restart and I tried to get in there and get another spot and it just didn’t work out.”
The Big Machine Vodka 400 at the Brickyard featured thirteen lead changes among eight drivers and was completed in a time of three hours and twenty minutes.
