Kevin Harvick took his No. 29 Budweiser/Armed Forces Chevrolet to victory lane in a wild finish of the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway. It was the third win of the season for the Richard Childress Racing driver and propelled him to second in the standings, just 36 markers out of the top spot. It is the 17th win of his NASCAR Sprint Cup Series career.
Harvick started 28th in the 43-car field for the scheduled 400-lap/600-mile race. In the early laps, his Gil Martin-led team overcame handling issues to steadily move Harvick up in the running order.
As is usually the case in the season’s longest race, the drama built as the laps ran down and fuel mileage came to the surface as potentially being an influence in the finish. When the caution flag flew for the final time on lap 397 forcing the race into an overtime green-white-checkered scenario, Harvick was in ninth place. But the fuel situation forced some of the leaders down pit road while others, including race-long front-runner Dale Earnhardt, Jr., No. 88 National Guard/AMP Energy Chevrolet, stayed out to make a charge for the victory.
Harvick also stayed out taking the green flag for the final time from fifth position. Earnhardt took the lead with one lap to go but ran out of fuel on the backstretch as Harvick was charging toward the front. Harvick took the checkered flag and was credited with leading two laps, bringing his total laps led for his three wins to nine laps.
Earnhardt had enough momentum to coast through turns three and four into the tri-oval and take the checkered flag in seventh place. With his sixth top-10 finish of the season, he remains fourth in the standings.
David Ragan (Ford), Joey Logano (Toyota), Kurt Busch (Dodge) and A.J. Allmendinger (Ford) completed the top-five finishers.
“[Sunday] we were lucky,” Harvick said. “I told them at the beginning of this thing that we haven’t fixed this thing in two weeks, there’s no way we’re going to fix it [Sunday]. Nothing against this race track—I just don’t like racing here. It just doesn’t feel right. ... I griped and griped and griped all freaking day long about how terrible it was. I just have a bad attitude here, so hopefully this helps.”
Earnhardt said he would have been lucky, too, if he had won the race.
“We weren’t supposed to win [Sunday night],” Earnhardt said. “We played our hand, and those other guys came in [for fuel]. I tried to save a ton of gas, but I know I didn’t save enough. I tried to save as much as I could. I’m disappointed we didn’t win. I know all our fans were disappointed to come so close.
FIN CAR DRIVER MAKE 1 29 Kevin Harvick Chevrolet 2 6 David Ragan Ford 3 20 Joey Logano Toyota 4 22 Kurt Busch Dodge 5 43 A.J. Allmendinger Ford 6 9 Marcos Ambrose Ford 7 88 Dale Earnhardt Jr. Chevrolet 8 78 Regan Smith Chevrolet 9 0 David Reutimann Toyota 10 11 Denny Hamlin Toyota 11 21 Ricky Stenhouse Jr. Ford 12 42 Juan Montoya Chevrolet 13 16 Greg Biffle Ford 14 17 Matt Kenseth Ford 15 33 Clint Bowyer Chevrolet 16 99 Carl Edwards Ford 17 14 Tony Stewart Chevrolet 18 83 Brian Vickers Toyota 19 2 Brad Keselowski Dodge 20 24 Jeff Gordon Chevrolet 21 31 Jeff Burton Chevrolet 22 4 Kasey Kahne Toyota 23 13 Casey Mears Toyota 24 47 Bobby Labonte Toyota 25 38 Travis Kvapil Ford 26 56 Martin Truex Jr. Toyota 27 36 Dave Blaney Chevrolet 28 48 Jimmie Johnson Chevrolet 29 27 Paul Menard Chevrolet 30 32 Mike Bliss Ford 31 39 Ryan Newman Chevrolet 32 18 Kyle Busch Toyota 33 34 David Gilliland Ford 34 5 Mark Martin Chevrolet 35 9 Landon Cassill Chevrolet 36 195 David Starr Ford 37 1 Jamie McMurray Chevrolet 38 7 Robby Gordon Dodge 39 66 Michael McDowell Toyota 40 30 David Stremme Chevrolet 41 87 Joe Nemechek Toyota 42 46 J.J. Yeley Chevrolet 43 60 Mike Skinner Toyota
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