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NASCAR SPRINT CUP SERIES: COCA-COLA 600

May 29, 2016

Kevin Harvick

Concord, North Carolina

THE MODERATOR: We're going to roll right into our post‑race for tonight's 57th‑annual Coca‑Cola 600 here at Charlotte Motor Speedway. Our race runner‑up is Kevin Harvick. He drives the No.4 Jimmy John's Chevrolet for Stewart‑Haas Racing. Certainly your car got much better there towards the end of that race. You were obviously going up there, trying to catch Martin Truex Jr. Just talk about your race out here today and how the 4 car found itself there late towards the race.
KEVIN HARVICK: Yeah, we struggled the first 450 miles, but they kept swinging at it and were finally able to find some tire pressures that were better. At the beginning of the race we were just having the same problem getting in the corner and then sliding the back of the car up off the corner, and towards the end we got the car on the racetrack a lot better and were able to really start driving it like we needed to to keep up. You know, I think we'd have been better off if they would have just kept running, but when the caution came out, because we had caught the 78, passed the 48, and then once he got new tires and an adjustment on there, it seemed like he was kind of able to get out in front of us, and we were never really able to make up any ground once we got around the 48.

Q. Was it frustrating to never‑‑ as good as you were those last few laps, was it frustrating to never get in a position where you never had a chance to race him?
KEVIN HARVICK: Not really. We ran 10th all day. I'm just really, really happy with‑‑ when you're able to take a 10th‑place car at best, for the first 450 miles and make adjustments on it, those are huge gains. I was just happy we were competitive at the end of the race. We didn't have the fastest car, obviously. It seemed like the 78 must have led the whole race. Those guys definitely have had some fast cars this year, and tonight definitely had the dominant car.

Q. Kevin, as far as this race played out, you've won it twice before, but how challenging was tonight, just not only with trying to run down Martin but with how much it seemed like the track did change from daytime to dusk through the night because it looked like tonight the transition happened a lot quicker than what we're used to seeing here.
KEVIN HARVICK: Yeah, it's like it happened all at once. I think as you look at this particular race, I've been here and seen it play out a lot of different ways, but I was on the side of the screaming driver for the first 400 miles tonight that‑‑ it's frustrating, so mentally I think this was the bigger challenge tonight than it was physically driving the car, just for the fact that nothing seemed to be working, and then they just finally stepped back and swung for the fence on some really big changes, and all of a sudden it woke up. I think with the track changing and their adjustments and the things that they did really got us back in contention.

Q. What goes through your mind when you have to watch somebody like Martin be as good as he was tonight for as long as he was and just knowing if we can make it work, we can go and chase him and just nobody ever seemed to find it?
KEVIN HARVICK: Well, I saw him for about 50 miles or 75 miles. The rest of the night I never saw him. I was back there swatting flies in the middle of the pack. I didn't have a lot of time to see the 78.

Q. Kevin, comparing the racing tonight versus last Saturday night, I realize it's hard to judge when one guy dominates, but did you feel as if going back to the old package with the skew made a difference in terms of like how comfortable the cars were? Were they sliding less? It seemed like there was a little less passing toward the front.
KEVIN HARVICK: Yeah, I'd have to really go back and think about that. I think obviously with the smaller spoiler and the less skew and the things that we're getting ready to do, I think everybody wants to go in that direction. I can't‑‑ I didn't really‑‑ the All‑Star Race is just so much different. I don't know if it's a fair assessment of was it better or was it worse. I think both nights we've seen good racing. We were able to pass tonight with our car once we got the handling better and make up ground, so I don't know what the racing was like with the rest of the pack, but I think as you look at what's coming down the road, I think that the cars were already sliding around a fair amount tonight. They seemed like they slid around more tonight than they did actually at the All‑Star Race. But my car had some different balance characteristics tonight than it had at the All‑Star Race. But I think compared to last year, we're light years ahead of where we were, and I think we're headed in a great direction with the new package.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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