{"id":21285,"date":"2018-08-17T21:48:50","date_gmt":"2018-08-18T02:48:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/?p=21285"},"modified":"2018-08-17T21:55:34","modified_gmt":"2018-08-18T02:55:34","slug":"kevin-harvicks-motivation-capitalizes-on-more-moments-to-win-races","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/2018\/08\/17\/kevin-harvicks-motivation-capitalizes-on-more-moments-to-win-races\/","title":{"rendered":"Kevin Harvick’s motivation capitalizes on more moments to win races"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Holly Cain, NASCAR Wire Service<\/em><\/p>\n

Kevin Harvick<\/strong> was all smiles and optimism Friday morning at Bristol Motor Speedway<\/strong>, as eager for another week of Monster Energy NASCAR Cup<\/a> racing as he\u2019s been in his championship career.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Kevin Harvick, driver of the #4 Busch Beer Ford, practices for the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Food City 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway on April 13, 2018 in Bristol, Tennessee. (Photo by Sean Gardner\/Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Winning will do that to you. And Harvick is winning A LOT. With a series best seven trophies already \u2013 earning two in the last four races – optimism and enthusiasm are not a problem.<\/p>\n

“It\u2019s fun,” Harvick said smiling. \u201cThe biggest thing for me is I\u2019ve been totally on the opposite side of this and you come to the race track knowing that you don\u2019t have a chance every week and what are you gonna do to fix it and how are you gonna fix it.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow, you know you have a shot. Coming to the race track you\u2019ve got a group of guys and a team and an organization and a manufacturer and everybody who is trying to figure out how to keep it going and doing everything that they can to keep progressing the cars and the team and everything around it.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor me, it\u2019s kind of full circle and I think over the last almost five years now we\u2019ve been fortunate to have a lot of success \u2013 nothing is really different this year.\u201d<\/p>\n

Even with all the success, Saturday night\u2019s Bass Pro Shops NRA Night Race (6:30 p.m. ET, NBCSN, PRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) typically proves challenging even for the best.<\/p>\nhttp:\/\/racedaysa.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Bristol2_MENCS_Harvick_081718.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n

 <\/p>\n

Harvick boasts the fifth best driver rating among his competition and has won at the famous half-miler twice before, most recently this same Fall night race in 2016. But his primary championship challenger, six-time 2018 winner Kyle Busch has proven to be a master at Bristol with 21 wins spread out in NASCAR\u2019s three elite series.<\/p>\n

He has won seven times in the Cup race, including the last two races at Bristol.<\/p>\n

Harvick, however, is not engaged in a one-up game with the competition. With the luxury of the trophy haul and playoff ticket secured, his No. 4 Stewart-Haas Racing Ford team can be aggressive. Their work each week is a reflection of the high standard of preparation and expectation that will ultimately benefit them when the 10-race playoff run begins Sept. 16 in Las Vegas.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think the success is obviously what everybody is here for and when you get that on the weekends and you\u2019re able to do those types of things and you don\u2019t have to be a part of the process and the push to fight every week of what you do to get there, I think that really helps keep everybody motivated,” Harvick said.  <\/p>\n

Keeping everyone motivated and on top of the game hasn\u2019t appeared to be any problem for this team, led by crew chief Rodney Childers. And not only are they working hard, they are enjoying the moments of reward.<\/p>\n

On Sunday, Harvick\u2019s six-year old son Keelan was allowed to meet up with his father on track after the victory lap. He gladly collect the checkered flag, climbed in his dad race-winning car and waved the flag out the window as Harvick drove to victory lane.<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2026it was just a great moment and super-happy that NASCAR was willing to cooperate and let us do what we wanted to do,” Harvick said, grinning again at the moment. \u201cWhat a memory and to be able to do that as a dad, all you dads know that\u2019s pretty cool to celebrate stuff like that with your son at work.\u201d<\/p>\n

Going forward, Harvick has reason to believe he can keep the success going. Closing out the regular season on a high note is statistically favorable too.<\/p>\n

Harvick has won at the Darlington, S.C. and Indianapolis tracks, next up after Bristol and close out the regular season. Both of those victories came from the pole position too.<\/p>\n

He\u2019s finished in the top-five in four of the last five races at Darlington and led 518 of his career total 581 laps at that track in that time frame. He won from pole at Indy in 2003 and has finished in the top-10 in the last four races there.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were able to win a championship [in 2014], but that was a year that I put the performance right up next to where we are [now], even 2015, but I think this year we\u2019ve just capitalized on more moments to win races and in the end that\u2019s really what it\u2019s all about is how many times do you get to Victory Lane,\u201d Harvick said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Holly Cain, NASCAR Wire Service Kevin Harvick was all smiles and optimism Friday morning at Bristol Motor Speedway, as eager for another week of Monster Energy NASCAR Cup racing as he\u2019s been in his championship career. Winning will do that to you. And Harvick is winning A LOT. With a series best seven trophies already<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":676,"featured_media":16349,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[11],"tags":[177,95,16],"class_list":["post-21285","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nascar","tag-bristol-motor-speedway","tag-kevin-harvick","tag-nascar"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7hzTZ-5xj","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":16398,"url":"http:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/2018\/04\/15\/nascar-race-preview-food-city-500-at-bristol-motor-speedway\/","url_meta":{"origin":21285,"position":0},"title":"NASCAR race preview: Food City 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway","author":"Mike Haag","date":"April 15, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"News, notes, audio and photos courtesy of NASCAR \u00a0 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Next Race: Food City 500 The Place: Bristol Motor Speedway The Date: Sunday, April 15 The Time: 2 p.m. ET TV: FOX, 1:30 p.m. ET Radio: PRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio Distance: 266.5 miles (500 laps); 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