He got his ride after Dale Earnhardt was killed in a Daytona 500 crash and Richard Childress Racing selected him to fill the legend’s seat. In Rockingham, the first time he sat in it, he started 36th and finished 14th, and two races later he held off Jeff Gordon to win in Atlanta.
Still, in his mind, Kevin Harvick thought many people doubted him, that they viewed him as nothing more than a shooting star who soon would fade into oblivion.
But he rose to 10th in the championship points race, finished second in the Coca-Cola 600 and collected more than $1.7 million in prize money. But still that feeling remained with him and it did not matter it was more fiction than fact. Inside of him burned the desire to reconfirm he was for real.
That is what he did Sunday when he won the inaugural Tropicana 400 at the Chicagoland Speedway with a poised and professional performance. He skirted trouble and dominated decisive restarts, skillfully handled a treacherous new track and eventually ran away from veterans Robert Pressley and Ricky Rudd.
Then, exposing and exorcising those thoughts that had been gnawing at him, he declared, “Everyone has been saying I’m a flash in the pan. Well, here’s another one and we’re going to keep at it.”
“He’s a talented driver,” runner-up Pressley said. “But [his success] just shows what a real race team’s all about. Richard Childress has won championships [with Earnhardt]. It has got great equipment. But he’s a heck of a driver. He’s taking advantage of the opportunity he got.”
Rudd also expressed admiration.
“It’s kind of like Jeff Gordon coming in,” said Rudd, who finished third. “It didn’t take him long to get adjusted. He’s in great equipment, winning equipment, and he has nothing but a great future.”
Harvick reconfirmed that Sunday in front of a crowd of 75,000 that filled Joliet’s new track, which again was infected with the yellow disease that had hit it during Saturday’s Busch race. Nine cautions slowed that race, 10 did the same to Sunday’s and, with no second groove to pass in, the latter often resembled a parade of cars simply turning left.
Track position was all important and Harvick had it through all 267 laps. He was first halfway through, first 25 laps from the end and first when the last caution of the day came out nine laps from the end.
Pressley was just behind him then and just ahead of Mark Martin, Dale Jarrett and Rudd. That meant the Tropicana would be settled on the restart that would come with only five laps remaining.
As they prepared for it, the 42-year-old Pressley crawled up on Harvick, drew so close to him that a phone book couldn’t have been stuck between them.
“Me and Kevin have never really raced together until today,” Pressley explained. “I was really just wanting to shake him up a little bit and maybe make him drive off into [turn] one a little bit harder or maybe spin the tires a little bit on takeoff. I knew that if I could get on the inside of him getting into one, and with everybody really close together, that we might shuffle him back a little bit and maybe have a shot.”
“I don’t know if he was trying to intimidate me or not,” said Harvick, 25. “But I’m sure I knocked the grill out of his car because he got a pretty good brake check. The game was over after that.”
The game was over as soon as Harvick shot away from Pressley, but in the group behind them, Martin’s car coughed and slowed, those around him scattered and Rudd found himself heading low and beneath the white line. That was a legal move, and when he returned to the track, he was by both Martin and Jarrett.
“That,” he said, “was one of those situations that made me look good.
“But, really, my choice was to run over the cars in front of me or to dive down and try to miss a wreck. That’s pretty much what I did. When I cleared it, I looked up and said, `Man, that turned out pretty good.’ That made it look like I knew what I was doing, but it was pretty much an accident.”
In front of him, Harvick would make no mistakes and soon he was celebrating the victory that reconfirmed him.
“Like I was telling a lot of people when we hired him, I said, `Kevin Harvick is the real deal,'” Childress said. “I think he has all he needs to be great.”
Does this victory give Harvick his own identity after he had dedicated his victory in Atlanta to Earnhardt?
“It does,” he said. “But, personally, I don’t mind everything being `in memory of’ because this is `in memory of.’ Dale Earnhardt is the reason we’re racing, and we want to do the best we can for him. That was our goal. I think that’s what he would have wanted us to do.
“Right now, I think, he’d be pretty proud of us.”
Sunday’s results
At Chicagoland Speedway, Joliet; Lap length: 1.5 miles
FIN: Finish place; SP: starting position; LAPS/OUT: Laps completed and reason out if applicable:
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FIN SP DRIVER CAR MAKE LAPS/OUT MONEY
1 6 Kevin Harvick Chevrolet 267 $162,500
2 13 Robert Pressley Ford 267 126,600
3 3 Ricky Rudd Ford 267 112,600
4 11 Dale Jarrett Ford 267 101,300
5 2 Jimmy Spencer Ford 267 94,200
6 18 Mark Martin Ford 267 77,100
7 37 Matt Kenseth Ford 267 70,650
8 31 Kurt Busch Ford 267 68,100
9 9 Sterling Marlin Dodge 267 65,900
10 4 Bill Elliott Dodge 267 71,080
11 36 Dale Earnhardt Jr. Chevrolet 267 70,800
12 35 Dave Blaney Dodge 267 54,800
13 21 Rusty Wallace Ford 267 69,300
14 1 Todd Bodine Ford 267 58,300
15 20 Elliott Sadler Ford 267 71,600
16 5 Joe Nemechek Chevrolet 267 62,600
17 28 Jeff Gordon Chevrolet 267 68,300
18 32 Jeff Burton Ford 266 69,100
19 10 Brett Bodine Ford 266 52,000
20 26 Ward Burton Dodge 266 62,600
21 33 Ricky Craven Ford 266 52,900
22 39 Michael Waltrip Chevrolet 266 57,900
23 23 John Andretti Dodge 266 58,900
24 15 Jason Leffler Dodge 266 58,600
25 40 Terry Labonte Chevrolet 266 58,300
26 25 Stacy Compton Dodge 266 50,500
27 34 Johnny Benson Pontiac 266 57,900
28 17 Casey Atwood Dodge 265 46,700
29 12 Ken Schrader Pontiac 265 54,500
30 22 Bobby Hamilton Chevrolet 264 54,800
31 42 Hut Stricklin Ford 262 46,100
32 38 Jeremy Mayfield Ford 259 63,900
33 27 Tony Stewart Pontiac 257, 65,900
crash
34 19 Kevin Lepage Chevrolet 255 45,500
35 41 Robby Gordon Ford 252 53,300
36 29 Jeff Green Chevrolet 243, 45,100
engine failure
37 8 Jerry Nadeau Chevrolet 239, 52,900
engine failure
38 43 Buckshot Jones Dodge 184, 52,700
crash
39 24 Bobby Labonte Pontiac 168, 69,500
engine failure
40 16 Ron Hornaday Jr. Pontiac 150, 44,300
engine failure
41 30 Steve Park Chevrolet 134, 52,100
fly wheel
42 7 Mike Skinner Chevrolet 22, 51,900
crash
43 14 Andy Houston Ford 3, 43,950
engine failure
%%
Winner’s average speed: 121.200 m.p.h. Time of race: 3 hours 18 minutes 16 seconds. Margin of victory: 0.649 seconds. Caution flags: 10 for 56 laps. Lead changes: 14 among 10 drivers.
Lap leaders: T.Bodine 1-6; Rudd 7-31; Harvick 32-42; Martin 43-50; Benson 51-53; Spencer 54-103; Harvick 104; B.Labonte 105-106; Sadler 107-108; Nadeau 109-137; Harvick 138-187; Nemechek 188-204; Harvick 205-229; Martin 230-241; Harvick 242-267
Point standings: J.Gordon, 2,515 Jarrett, 2,515 Rudd, 2,497 Wallace, 2,308 Marlin, 2,297 Stewart, 2,266 Harvick, 2,172 Earnhardt Jr., 2,140 Benson, 2,138 B.Labonte, 2,112.
