Chase Briscoe is 20/1 to win at Atlanta

 

CHASE BRISCOE Atlanta Advance No. 14 HighPoint.com Ford Mustang for Stewart-Haas Racing

Event Overview

● Event: Folds of Honor 500 (Round 5 of 36) ● Time/Date: 3 p.m. EDT on Sunday, March 20 ● Location:  Atlanta Motor Speedway ● Layout: 1.54-mile oval ● Laps/Miles: 325 laps/500 miles ● Stage Lengths: Stage 1: 105 laps / Stage 2: 105 laps / Final Stage: 115 laps ● TV/Radio: FOX / PRN / SiriusXM NASCAR Radio

Notes of Interest

● Chase Briscoe, driver of the No. 14 Ford Mustang for Stewart-Haas Racing (SHR), earned his first career NASCAR Cup Series victory Sunday at Phoenix Raceway. He joins Alan Kulwicki (1988) and Bobby Hamilton (1996) as the third driver to earn his first Cup Series win at the desert mile oval. He is also the first Cup Series driver to take a car carrying the No. 14 to victory lane at Phoenix, and is the 200th Cup Series winner of all time.   ● Briscoe started sixth at Phoenix and led three times for 101 laps. He held off a late-race charge from Tyler Reddick and Ross Chastain during a lap-293 restart and was in the top spot when the caution flag flew on lap 305 of the scheduled 312-lap race, setting up a green-white-checkered shootout. The 27-year-old from Mitchell, Indiana, then drove away from Reddick, Chastain and nine-time Phoenix winner and SHR teammate Kevin Harvick, among others, to score his first win in NASCAR’s top series and the first win for the No. 14 team since 2018. Clint Bowyer drove the No. 14 SHR Ford to victory in that year’s June race at Michigan.   ● Sunday’s Phoenix win came in just the 40th career start for the 2021 NASCAR Cup Series Rookie of the Year. It was just the fourth race for the new NextGen car, NASCAR’s latest version of stock car that debuted in 1949. In four races this season, Briscoe has earned a win, two top-three finishes and his career-best staring position on an oval – third at Las Vegas Motor Speedway the previous weekend. He is tied with Kyle Larson for fourth in the driver standings and currently holds a spot in the 16-driver playoff field.   ● Transform Your IT –The blue-and-white colors of HighPoint return to the No. 14 Mustang for the first time in 2022 after first appearing on Briscoe’s car in the NASCAR Xfinity Series in 2020. Briscoe earned four of his nine wins in the Xfinity Series that year sporting HighPoint colors and earned all three of his top-10s in his rookie Cup Series season with the company headquartered in Sparta, New Jersey. The leading IT infrastructure and solutions company introduces a more tech-inspired livery just in time for the Cup Series’ first visit to the transformed Atlanta Motor Speedway.   ● The track in Hampton, Georgia, underwent a reconfiguration in the offseason to create tighter, superspeedway-type racing on its 1.54-mile oval. The racing surface was narrowed from 55 feet to 40 feet and the banking was increased to 28 degrees – the most of any intermediate track on the schedule.   ● In two starts at Atlanta, Briscoe has a best finish of 15th earned last July. He also has three NASCAR Xfinity Series starts at Atlanta with a best finish of ninth in 2020, and a NASCAR Camping World Truck Series start there in 2017.   ● Last weekend’s victory was crew chief Johnny Klausmeier’s third win atop the pit box and first at Phoenix. Klausmeier’s 2019 SHR driver Aric Almirola qualified on the pole and brought home a top-10 at Atlanta.

Chase Briscoe, Driver of the No. 14 HighPoint.com Ford Mustang for Stewart-Haas Racing:

Talk about the emotional moment of being able to take the No. 14 car back to victory lane for your hero and now team co-owner Tony Stewart, and discussing the win with him postrace. “This car is obviously his, and he has a lot of passion and drive for that car. He took a chance on another guy who is kind of like himself, a dirt Sprint car racer. We grew up in towns that are 45 minutes apart and my dad raced against Tony in Sprint cars. I was a diehard Tony fan growing up and diehard 14 fan, so for me to add my name to the list of guys that have driven the No. 14 car to victory lane is definitely special for me. Looking back, when I was 6 or 7 years old and wearing the Tony Stewart helmet and uniform, I never in a million years thought I would get to take his car to victory lane in the Cup Series, and it was really cool for him to call, and to get to hear how excited he was for that to happen.”   Have you noticed any significant strides in yourself or the team compared to last year? “I think from a confidence standpoint I feel like I belong this year. Last year, it was very ‘eyes wide open.’ I was racing against guys I had watched on TV for years and that I’ve looked up to. Now I don’t look at the 18 car and go, ‘That’s Kyle Busch.’ It’s just the 18 car, another guy out there. I think that confidence has come a long way. Obviously with the results, the confidence builds. I feel like I belong. Especially, now, winning, I’ve proven I belong in the Cup Series. When you come in in your rookie year, you think you’re ready, but you’re never ready. To run up front and lead laps is special, for sure.”   Next we head to Atlanta and, even though you’ve raced there twice in the Cup Series, the track has undergone significant changes since the last visit. You’re coming off a win, which typically gives the team a lot of confidence and momentum, but how does the track change affect your preparation for this weekend? “It’s going to be wild. It’s great to win on Sunday, but this coming week there are going to be 39 guys that are going to try the same thing. A couple of guys in the shop asked me how it feels to get that first win and it feels good, but it doesn’t mean anything if we go run 40th this week. You’ve got to be able to go do it again. So I think, this week, there are a lot of unknowns for a lot of reasons. The NextGen car still is a big variable that we don’t really know a lot about, but then the track is totally different than anything we’ve ever had. It’s supposedly going to be like a mini-Daytona or Talladega with pack racing and drafting, but what really happens when we get there? It’s going to be intense, it’s going to be wild, it’s going to be a narrow track with a lot of speed and a lot of excitement. It’ll be interesting to see where we stack up when we get there. I don’t know what to expect. I’ve been on the simulator quite a bit trying to figure it out, but we won’t really know what it’s going to be like until we get there.”

Kyle Busch is 11/1 to win 2022 Folds of Honor QuikTrip 500 at Atlanta

 

KYLE BUSCH Starting Over at Atlanta   HUNTERSVILLE, North Carolina (March 15, 2022) – The NASCAR Cup Series heads to Atlanta Motor Speedway this weekend for the first of two races at the 1.54-mile oval this season. While the oval’s length remains the same, virtually every other aspect of the track that lies south of downtown Atlanta looks completely different than it did when the series last visited there in July.   Among the changes to Atlanta to go with new pavement to replace the worn-out surface are increases to its banking in the turns from 24 to 28 degrees, with the track width varying from 55 feet to 40 feet. The frontstretch width is now 52 feet, while the backstretch and turns are set at 42 and 40 feet wide, respectively.   What does this mean for the racing this weekend at Atlanta? It means the racing fans were used to seeing at Atlanta will look totally different and unlike any of the other 1.5-mile ovals on the schedule. While Atlanta is more than a mile less in length than Daytona (Fla.) International Speedway (2.5-mile oval)  and Talladega (Ala.) Superspeedway (2.66-mile oval), the changes expected to make the racing Atlanta look more like those two tracks than the traditional 1.5-mile track.   Never one to back down from a challenge, Kyle Busch, driver of the No. 18 M&M’S Toyota for Joe Gibbs Racing (JGR), will head to the new-look Atlanta to take on the new track surface and configuration, and what the racing on it may bring. While it’s designed to facilitate more pack-style racing, there are countless other unknowns thanks to not only the new layout, but because it’s just the fifth points-paying race for NASCAR’s new NextGen racecar.   Busch returns to the facility this weekend where the winning for him began with JGR in 2008. That was his first year with JGR, and he headed to Atlanta for the fourth Cup Series race of the season aiming to bring home the maiden victory for the team’s two new partners – Mars Wrigley with its SNICKERS brand, and Toyota. After leading a race-high 173 laps, Busch broke through for the first time in NASCAR’s top series for Toyota, which was in its second year of Cup Series competition and its first with JGR. Busch added an Atlanta Cup Series win in 2013 to go with eight top-five finishes and 11 top-10s over his career there.   So, as the Cup Series head to new-look Atlanta this weekend, Busch and the M&M’S team hope to be fast learners on a new surface with a new car in bringing home a third Cup Series win at the track. It would be extra sweet in this final year with M&M’S on board as a primary partner to win again at Atlanta with also would mark Busch’s milestone 60th Cup Series victory.

KYLE BUSCH, Driver of the No. 18 M&M'S Toyota Camry for Joe Gibbs Racing:

What are you expecting out of Atlanta this weekend with the big changes made to the track?   “Atlanta is going to be crazy. It literally got a facelift with a whole new track surface and layout and everything. Looking forward to getting to Atlanta. It’s going to be a different race than what we’ve had there in years past, where you have the old asphalt and really have fast lap times to fire off, and then you have a lot of fall-off where lap times go down throughout the run. That led to having some guys come up through the field and others drop through the field, whether or not they are fast early in the run or slow late in the run, or vice versa. This time around, it’s going to be more like a Daytona or Talladega speedway race. You are going to see a lot of pack racing with some guys two-wide and maybe three-wide, and we’ll have to see how wide the track gets in the time we have on it. Really paying attention and watching some of the Truck Series and Xfinity Series racing earlier in the weekend. It’s going to be helpful to see what we’ll have for Sunday. We’ll learn as much as we can and would like to figure out how to run up front and contend for the win with our M&M’S Camry TRD.”   What are your memories of racing at Atlanta? “I’ve won a few Truck Series races there. That was fun. I won for the first time in an Xfinity race there a few years ago, so that was very cool. I finished second three or four times, so it had been an Achilles heel for me, I guess. The Cup races there, I’ve either been really good or really bad, it seems. Obviously, it’s a whole new ballgame there, so we can throw out our notes from the past since it won’t mean a ton for this weekend or going forward there.”   You gave Toyota its first Cup Series win by scoring a victory at Atlanta in March 2008. What do you remember about that? “Running in Atlanta and being able to put Toyota in victory lane for the first time, that was special for me and for Joe Gibbs Racing and everybody. Certainly, that was neat. We’ve been fortunate to be able to put Toyota and Mars in victory lane a lot more times over the years. With it being the last year for Mars in NASCAR, it’s fun to look back at that win and see all that we’ve accomplished since then. It was really neat to get SNICKERS and Toyota to victory lane, but also having been able to sustain that with a lot more wins since then with M&M’S, Skittles, Doublemint and all the Mars Wrigley brands being able to go out there and win with them over the years.”

Event Overview:

● Event: Folds of Honor QuikTrip 500 (Round 5 of 36) ● Time/Date: 3 p.m. ET on Sunday, March 20 ● Location: Atlanta Motor Speedway ● Layout: 1.54-mile oval ● Laps/Miles: 325 laps/500 miles ● Stage Lengths: Stage 1: 105 laps / Stage 2: 105 laps / Final Stage: 115 laps ● TV/Radio: FOX / MRN / SiriusXM NASCAR Radio

Kevin Harvick continues Atlanta Motor Speedway dominance

Kevin Harvick was the 5/1 favorite to win Sunday.

June 6, 2020

 

By Holly Cain

NASCAR Wire Service

 

Kevin Harvick has had an exceptional relationship with Atlanta Motor Speedway and the 2014 NASCAR Cup Series champion showed that again Sunday afternoon winning the Folds of Honor QuikTrip 500, his third victory at the historic track.

 

Harvick led a race high 151 of 325 laps en route to his 51st career win, prevailing in a valiant contest with Joe Gibbs Racing teammates Kyle Busch and Martin Truex Jr., who finished second and third.

 

Truex led 62 laps, won the opening two stages of the race and kept Harvick’s No. 4 Stewart-Haas Racing Ford honest. Harvick passed both JGR Toyotas to open the third stage of the race and held them at bay to win by a healthy 3.527-seconds. Busch passed Truex for second with five laps to go.

 

It was Harvick’s second victory of the season (he also won at Darlington Raceway in NASCAR’s first race back since the sport was sidelined during the COVID-19 pandemic) and it is the 44-year old Californian’s ninth top-10 finish in 10 races this year. With it, Harvick extends his NASCAR Cup Series championship lead to 48 points over Penske Racing’s Joey Logano. 

 

Logano’s teammate Ryan Blaney and JGR driver Denny Hamlin rounded out the Top-5 at Atlanta followed by Kurt Busch, Jimmie Johnson, Chase Elliott and Penske Racing teammates Brad Keselowski and Logano. For Kurt Busch, the Top-10 was an especially impressive effort considering he started last in the field because of inspection violations.

 

Clint Bowyer led 58 laps only to have to pit late in the race and fall out of a Top-10 finish.  He ended up 20th. 

 

Harvick’s Ford was considered the car to beat at Atlanta even before the retiring seven-time NASCAR Cup Series champion Johnson gave the command to start engines Sunday afternoon.

 

Harvick earned an emotional career first NASCAR Cup Series win at Atlanta back in 2001, three weeks after taking over driving duties for the late seven-time champion Dale Earnhardt, who was killed in the Daytona 500 season-opener. Harvick held up three fingers in a reverse victory lap Sunday in honor of Earnhardt and the champ’s famed No. 3 car.

 

"First [career] win came for me here at Atlanta and this is just a race track that I’ve taken a liking to,’’ Harvick said. "You always have those memories and now you want to celebrate everything that Dale Earnhardt did for this sport. To come here and be able to do that with wins and go to victory lane is pretty special.

 

"We had a great pit stop, got to restart on the bottom and got my car to take off and I was able to get track position. Once I could get through those first 10 laps and my car was freed up enough I could get in a rhythm and really hit my marks, then with about 25 laps I could just drive away.’’

 

Harvick has certainly been the driver of record as of late. He answered that first win 17 years later (in 2018) and is currently in the midst of an amazing nine-year run at the track. He’s now led at least 100 laps in seven of the last nine races – more than 10,000 laps out front since joining the Stewart-Haas Racing team in 2014. And he’s earned Top-10 finishes in nine of the last 11 races.

 

Truex Jr.’s two stages wins were the 2017 NASCAR Cup Series champion’s first of the season. And for much of the race, he was there ready to interrupt Harvick’s longtime dominance at the track. That opportunity never came.

 

It would have been the first win of the season for Truex, who has been so-close at Atlanta  -finishing second in 2019 and scoring Top-10 finishes in the last six races.

 

Tyler Reddick, driver of the No. 8 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet, was the top finishing Sunoco Rookie of the Year candidate – with a 16th-place finish.

 

Prior to the race NASCAR President Steve Phelps addressed the race field and the nation pledging that the sport is absolutely sensitive to the country’s current social unrest and committed to improving race relations.

 

"Our country is in pain and our people are justifiably angry, demanding to be heard,’’ Phelps said. "Our sport must do better. Our country must do better.’’

 

The NASCAR Cup Series races next in the Blue-Emu Maximum Pain Relief 500 at Martinsville (Va.) Speedway on Wednesday (7 p.m. ET, FS1, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). 

 

--30--

 

NASCAR Cup Series Race - 61st Annual Folds of Honor QuikTrip 500

Atlanta Motor Speedway

Hampton, Georgia

Sunday, June 7, 2020

 

               1. (9)  Kevin Harvick, Ford, 325.

               2. (4)  Kyle Busch, Toyota, 325.

               3. (11)  Martin Truex Jr., Toyota, 325.

               4. (7)  Ryan Blaney, Ford, 325.

               5. (10)  Denny Hamlin, Toyota, 325.

               6. (12)  Kurt Busch, Chevrolet, 325.

               7. (15)  Jimmie Johnson, Chevrolet, 325.

               8. (1)  Chase Elliott, Chevrolet, 325.

               9. (6)  Brad Keselowski, Ford, 325.

               10. (3)  Joey Logano, Ford, 325.

               11. (16)  Austin Dillon, Chevrolet, 324.

               12. (8)  Alex Bowman, Chevrolet, 324.

               13. (22)  Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Chevrolet, 324.

               14. (17)  Ryan Newman, Ford, 324.

               15. (19)  Matt Kenseth, Chevrolet, 324.

               16. (24)  Tyler Reddick #, Chevrolet, 324.

               17. (2)  Aric Almirola, Ford, 324.

               18. (27)  Christopher Bell #, Toyota, 324.

               19. (31)  Cole Custer #, Ford, 324.

               20. (5)  Clint Bowyer, Ford, 324.

               21. (23)  Bubba Wallace, Chevrolet, 324.

               22. (13)  Chris Buescher, Ford, 324.

               23. (18)  John Hunter Nemechek #, Ford, 324.

               24. (36)  Michael McDowell, Ford, 324.

               25. (21)  Matt DiBenedetto, Ford, 324.

               26. (29)  Ryan Preece, Chevrolet, 323.

               27. (25)  Corey LaJoie, Ford, 323.

               28. (14)  Erik Jones, Toyota, 322.

               29. (28)  Ty Dillon, Chevrolet, 322.

               30. (33)  Brennan Poole #, Chevrolet, 321.

               31. (37)  Daniel Suarez, Toyota, 316.

               32. (35)  Quin Houff #, Chevrolet, 314.

               33. (20)  William Byron, Chevrolet, 313.

               34. (32)  Josh Bilicki(i), Ford, 313.

               35. (34)  Garrett Smithley(i), Chevrolet, 312.

               36. (30)  JJ Yeley(i), Chevrolet, 311.

               37. (40)  Reed Sorenson, Chevrolet, 310.

               38. (26)  Joey Gase(i), Ford, 308.

               39. (38)  Timmy Hill(i), Toyota, Electrical, 259.

               40. (39)  BJ McLeod(i), Chevrolet, Clutch, 3.

 

Average Speed of Race Winner:  142.966 mph.

Time of Race:  3 Hrs, 30 Mins, 3 Secs. Margin of Victory:  3.527 Seconds.

Caution Flags:  5 for 24 laps.

Lead Changes:  21 among 9 drivers.

Lap Leaders:   C. Elliott 1-26;B. Keselowski 27;J. Logano 28-36;K. Harvick 37-65;M. Truex Jr. 66-68;K. Busch 69;K. Harvick 70-86;M. Truex Jr. 87-108;C. Bowyer 109-113;M. Truex Jr. 114;C. Bowyer 115-146;M. Truex Jr. 147-159;B. Keselowski 160-163;C. Bowyer 164-184;M. Truex Jr. 185-203;K. Busch 204-206;M. Truex Jr. 207-213;K. Busch 214-217;K. Harvick 218-267;R. Blaney 268-269;J. Logano 270;K. Harvick 271-325.

Leaders Summary (Driver, Times Lead, Laps Led):  Kevin Harvick 4 times for 151 laps; Martin Truex Jr. 6 times for 65 laps; Clint Bowyer 3 times for 58 laps; Chase Elliott 1 time for 26 laps; Joey Logano 2 times for 10 laps; Kyle Busch 2 times for 7 laps; Brad Keselowski 2 times for 5 laps; Ryan Blaney 1 time for 2 laps; Kurt Busch 1 time for 1 lap.

Stage #1 Top Ten: 19,18,14,11,4,9,47,20,48,12

Stage #2 Top Ten: 19,12,18,11,9,4,21,2,14,48

Kevin Harvick wins for third time at Atlanta

Kevin Harvick wins his third race at Atlanta after taking over for Dale Earnhardt in 2001. Harvick Dominates To Score Win At Atlanta Busch Light For The Farmers Ford Mustang Driver Leads 151 Laps; Still First in Point

Date: June 7, 2020 Event: Folds of Honor 500 (Round 10 of 36) Series: NASCAR Cup Series Location: Atlanta Motor Speedway (1.54-mile oval) Format: 325 laps, broken into three stages (105 laps/105 laps/115 laps) Start/Finish: 9th/1st (Running, completed 325 of 325 laps) Point Standing: 1st with 421 points, 48 ahead of second place Race Winner: Kevin Harvick of Stewart-Haas Racing (Ford) Stage 1 Winner: Martin Truex Jr. of Joe Gibbs Racing (Toyota) Stage 2 Winner: Martin Truex Jr. of Joe Gibbs Racing (Toyota) Stage 1 Recap (Laps 1-105): ●  Kevin Harvick started ninth and finished fifth, earning six bonus points. ●  The Busch Light For The Farmers Ford Mustang driver pitted on lap 27 for four tires, fuel, a track bar adjustment and tape on the grill. Came in fourth and came out third. ●  On lap 36, Harvick got by Joey Logano and took the lead. ●  Harvick brought the car to pit road while leading on lap 67 for four tires, fuel and a track bar adjustment. ●  Brought the No. 4 Busch Light For The Farmers Ford Mustang to pit road on lap 96 for four tires, fuel and a track bar adjustment. Stage 2 Recap (Laps 106-210): ●  Kevin Harvick started seventh and finished sixth, earning five bonus points. ●  The Busch Light For The Farmers Ford Mustang driver pitted on lap 108 for four tires, fuel and a track bar adjustment on the left side. ●  On lap 159, Harvick was in fourth and pitted for four tires, fuel, along with a tire pressure and chassis adjustment. ●  Harvick pitted on lap 202 for four tires, fuel and a tire pressure adjustment. Said car was plowing tight. Final Stage Recap (Laps 211-325): ●  Kevin Harvick started third and finished first.   ●  The Busch Light For The Farmers Ford Mustang driver pitted on lap 212 for four tires, fuel and a track bar adjustment. Came into the pits in sixth and left in third-place. ●  On lap 268 while leading, Harvick pitted for four tires, fuel and a chassis adjustment. ●  Harvick led from lap 271 to the end of the race to score his 51st career victory. Notes: ●  Harvick’s victory in the Folds of Honor 500 marked the 75th overall win for SHR. It was the organization’s 57th points-paying NASCAR Cup Series win, its second of the season and its third at Atlanta. ●  Tony Stewart scored SHR’s first win at Atlanta in September 2010 while Harvick won for the team in February 2018. ●  This was SHR’s 21st NASCAR Cup Series victory with Ford. The team won its first race with Ford when former driver Kurt Busch captured the 2017 Daytona 500. ●  This was Ford’s series-leading sixth NASCAR Cup Series win of the season and its 692nd all-time Cup Series victory. ●  This was Ford’s 34th NASCAR Cup Series victory at Atlanta. Ford has now won the past four races at Atlanta. Brad Keselowski won in 2017 and 2019, and Harvick won in 2018. ●  This was Harvick’s 51st career NASCAR Cup Series win, giving him sole possession of 12th on the all-time NASCAR Cup Series win list. Just ahead of Harvick is NASCAR Hall of Famer Lee Petty with 54 victories. ●  This was Harvick’s 28th NASCAR Cup Series victory since joining SHR in 2014. ●  Harvick earned his second victory of the season and his third victory in 30 career NASCAR Cup Series starts at Atlanta. ●  Harvick scored his first career NASCAR Cup Series victory at Atlanta on March 11, 2001. He beat Jeff Gordon by .006 of a second. ●  Harvick has finished in the top-10 in nine of the 10 races held this year. His lone finish outside the top-10: 11th May 31 at Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway. ●  Harvick is the only NASCAR Cup Series driver to have finished in the top-11 in all 10 races held this season. ●  Harvick has finished among the top-11 in 15 straight NASCAR Cup Series races, a streak that began on Oct. 20, 2019 when he finished ninth in the Hollywood Casino 400 at Kansas Speedway in Kansas City. ●  This is Harvick’s third straight top-five at Atlanta. He finished fourth in the series’ previous visit to the track in February 2019. ●  In the last 16 races at Atlanta, Harvick has finished in the top-10 13 times. ●  Since 2011, Harvick has only finished outside the top-10 once at Atlanta (19th in 2014). ●  Harvick finished fifth in Stage 1 to earn six bonus points and sixth in Stage 2 to earn five more bonus points. ●  Harvick led four times for a race-high 151 laps to increase his laps-led total at Atlanta to 1,348, the most among active drivers. ●  When Harvick took the lead for the first time on lap 37 of the Folds of Honor 500, he led his 10,000th lap since joining SHR in 2014. Harvick has led 14,576 laps in his entire NASCAR Cup Series career. Kevin Harvick, driver of the No. 4 Busch Light For The Farmers Ford Mustang for Stewart-Haas Racing: “Obviously, first win came for me here at Atlanta and this is just a race track that I’ve taken a liking to, and you always come back and have those memories and now you want to celebrate everything that Dale Earnhardt did for this sport.  To come here and be able to do that with wins and go to victory lane is pretty special, so I just have to thank everybody from Busch Light.  We’ve got corn all over our car this week, so Busch Light for the farmer’s campaign.  Go buy those corn cans so we can donate $100,000. We struggled most of the day with our car and he (crew chief Rodney Childers) definitely earned his birthday present today.  It’s one of my favorite tracks for sure and I love to win here. I was able to get track position and then once I could get through those first 10 laps and my car was freed up enough to where I could get in a rhythm and really start hitting my marks, and then by about lap 25 I could start driving away.  I’m just proud of everybody from Busch Light and Ford, Stewart-Haas Racing.  Thank you guys for everything.  Hunt Brothers Pizza, Fields, Mobil 1, Jimmy John’s.  I know I’m gonna forget somebody. Haas, everybody who helps us on this car and you the fans. We appreciate everything you guys do for us.” Next Up: The next event on the NASCAR Cup Series schedule is the Blue-Emu Maximum Pain Relief 500 on Wednesday, June 10 at Martinsville (Va.) Speedway. The race starts at 7 p.m. EDT with live coverage provided by FS1 and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.

Kevin Harvick is 5/1 favorite to win at Atlanta

KEVIN HARVICK For The Farmers KANNAPOLIS, North Carolina (June 4, 2020) – Kevin Harvick will drive a bit of a different-looking car this week. Busch Light, the beer brewed for America’s heartland and a longtime supporter of agricultural communities, will clad Harvick’s car in a corn-themed, Farm Rescue paint scheme for this Sunday’s Folds of Honor 500 at Atlanta Motor Speedway. His Stewart-Haas Racing (SHR) teammate Clint Bowyer will have a similar-looking scheme. Busch announced last week it will provide funds for the nonprofit Farm Rescue to begin harvest assistance operations in Kansas immediately. The expansion will allow Farm Rescue to provide free harvest assistance to farm families experiencing a major illness, injury or natural disaster. Since its inception in 2005, Farm Rescue has helped nearly 700 family farms sustain operations in times of crisis. These efforts are made possible through a network of volunteers from across the United States. Busch has been a partner of Farm Rescue since early 2019 and played an instrumental role in facilitating Farm Rescue’s entry into Kansas with a mix of financial support, public affairs assistance and more. Kansas is the first new state to be added to Farm Rescue’s support network since 2017 and will be the seventh state supported overall. Busch recently teased the news of this partnership with the release of its special-edition Busch Light Corn Cans, a remixed edition of the classic Busch Light can and packaging. Consumers nationwide can support Farm Rescue with every purchase of the new limited-edition Busch Light corn packs in select states. For each pack purchased in these states between May 18 and July 5, 2020, $1 will be donated by Busch, up to $100,000, to benefit Farm Rescue’s ongoing efforts. Throughout the race, fans will have the chance to win a suite of farm-related prizes. More information can be found at @BuschBeer on Twitter ahead of June 7. Fans can head to ForTheFarmers.org to learn more and to stay informed as race day approaches. Harvick has only two Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series wins at Atlanta, but has been strong there since 2008, with 12 top-10 finishes in 15 races. He’s led a series-high 1,197 laps and has led 100 laps in six of the last eight races. He’s also won four of his last six NASCAR Xfinity Series races at the 1.54-mile oval. Atlanta has always been a special place for Harvick as he scored his first career Cup Series victory there in 2001. Following Dale Earnhardt’s death on the final lap of that year’s Daytona 500, Harvick was named the driver of the No. 29 Chevrolet for Richard Childress Racing and made his series debut the following weekend at Rockingham (N.C.) Speedway, where he finished 14th. On March 11, less than one month since his debut in NASCAR’s top series and in just his third start, Harvick won his first Cup Series race at Atlanta. Harvick is hoping that he can take the Busch Light For the Farmers Ford Mustang to victory lane in Atlanta. And, as a bonus, it would become the site of his first and 51st NASCAR Cup Series wins.

KEVIN HARVICK, Driver of the No. 4 Busch Light For The Farmers Ford Mustang for Stewart-Haas Racing:

You’ve had a solid start to the year so far. What are your thoughts going to Atlanta? “I don’t know. As you go there, Atlanta is a place where you expect to run well. As you look at all the differences in cars and changes in tires and the differences we’ve had to face this year, you’ve got to go run the race and wrap your arms around where everything is.” What do you like about the Atlanta Motor Speedway layout? “I just love the abrasiveness of the racetrack. It still has a lot of speed for the first three or four laps, but then it has a lot of fall-off and a lot of bumps that give it character. As a driver, you just love the challenge that comes with racing at Atlanta. This is always one that I circle on my calendar as a favorite and I look forward to racing in Atlanta this weekend.”  You were a rookie in 2001 and won your first race at Atlanta. What do you remember about your rookie year? “Well, it wasn’t supposed to be my rookie year. We didn’t run the Daytona 500, obviously. And then, you know, Dale Earnhardt died, (I) got in the car the next week, I got married. I think 70 or 71 races between the Cup Series and the Busch Series that year. Raced for both championships. Won my first Cup race, we won a Busch Series championship, we won the Cup rookie of the year. But I was so sheltered from everything that was going on. The only real taste I got of the magnitude of the Earnhardt situation, really, I can think back to and say, ‘You know, that was a massive situation.’ Obviously, I know it was, now. But when I think back to that first press conference that we had in Rockingham and the magnitude and the reach of what was in that tent that day, that was really the only thing I was exposed to that year was, ‘Um, wow, this is a huge moment.’ Even winning that first race, and I’m not one to go back and just watch the videos and listen to the chatter of the media and the things that are happening. And we were testing, either the Busch car or the Cup car, or we were racing. We built our first truck that year. I ran that at Richmond. So there were so many things that were moving around that I honestly don’t remember really anything from that year. Other than, you know, I remember building that truck in Ed Berrier’s garage with my Busch team – with Todd Berrier and those guys. After we would get done at work, they’d come over and help me build the truck. But really, everything else is kind of a blur because there was so much happening. And it wound up being a good thing to be sheltered from what was going on and all the talk and all the hype and everything.”