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NASCAR CUP SERIES: BASS PRO SHOPS NIGHT RACESeptember 19, 2020Kevin HarvickBristol, Tennessee THE MODERATOR: Kevin, congratulations on yet another win. Can you just talk us through your run. KEVIN HARVICK: Yeah, we had just a really, really good Busch Light Ford Mustang tonight. I got it a little dinged up with 50 or 60 laps to go. I knocked a hole in the nose and made it a little too tight through the center of the corner, but turned into a heck of a race, in and out of traffic there with Kyle. He got me once pinned up there in traffic and I was able to do the same thing back and then hold the lead there until the end. Just really proud of everybody for everything that they've done all year and just continuing to fight, and there's not many races that you can win that are like winning here at the Bristol night race. That was a lot of fun. Q. It seems like you guys have maybe separated yourselves a little bit from Hamlin. You guys were kind of 1A, 1B through the regular season. Do you feel like you've separated yourselves from them a little bit performance‑wise? KEVIN HARVICK: I don't really know. I hadn't really paid attention. We're nose‑down trying to do what we do. I'd have to go back and find out all the things that happened. That stuff can flip around and turn the other direction really quick. They all outran us‑‑ I felt like the Gibbs cars outran us at Richmond. We struggled at Darlington and figured out a great strategy and wound up capitalizing on a late accident there, and tonight probably had the best car. It can go either way. It's just those days that you don't have a really good car what happens and how you can rebound from that, and on the days you do have a good car, hopefully finding Victory Lane. It's been a battle some weeks, and some weekends it's been good, but we've been able to capitalize on the good weeks. Q. How do you feel going into round 2? Everybody knows the Roval, Talladega, a lot of trepidation there, but you guys got a lot of bonus points. Are you feeling confident, nervous? KEVIN HARVICK: I'm not really nervous. I don't think we lack any confidence. But I think as you look at every round, even this round, you had some‑‑ every race can be a challenge, and that's how we approach it. We're confident that we can do what we need to do, and whether that's good enough, you don't know, and sometimes you have circumstances out of your control or you do something wrong and screw something up. So you just never know. I think we all had a lot of faith in each other as team members, and we just go week to week and just battle and see where we're at and go from there. Q. Those last 60 laps you navigated through lap traffic pretty well. What can you say about the job your spotter Tim did tonight and the job he did guiding you through that lap traffic? How great was that to have on your side? KEVIN HARVICK: Well, I think the best‑‑ Timmy was on it tonight. He was one step ahead of me, and that really helps because you can't really see all the way out of the corner when you're entering the corner and headed to the center of the corner, you can't really tell. Him being one step ahead of me so I know what to do when I get to the next corner as far as low or high line definitely puts us in a great spot. He definitely did a great job. The biggest turning point of the night was when we were coming to pit road, cars beside me spun out and we stayed on the racetrack and without clipping the box or anything and put a bunch of them a lap down, so that was definitely a big moment. Q. You've won now with fans in the stands, but tonight was another win with an even bigger crowd. We had 30,000 out there tonight. How awesome was it coming to the start‑finish line and seeing the fans? KEVIN HARVICK: Yeah, you know, that really started before the race. I hadn't been to too many races where I've been that jacked up getting in the race car. The fans were so enthusiastic tonight and I don't know if we've just been away from them for that long, but you could feel the enthusiasm in the stadium tonight. I think as I was getting in the car, I was just wound up and just really, really ready to race, and then after the race just the excitement that you could hear and the cheering from the crowd just made me excited. I haven't felt that in a while, and when you look at Bristol, it's always very enthusiastic, but tonight these people were so wound up. I think we're all tired of sitting at home and not really knowing what to do. But tonight they all let it loose, and that gave me a lot of excitement, as well. Q. How do you feel about continuing your Chase for the Championship next weekend at Las Vegas Motor Speedway? KEVIN HARVICK: You know, we've just got to keep doing what we're doing. I think as you look at Vegas, it's a low‑grip racetrack. I think it's probably been some of our races that we've had most of our trouble at, but we've figured out a way to race well and strategize well and do what we need to do, so we're just going to go out there and battle. We've got a whole new car going out there, so we'll just do what we've been doing every week and hopefully put ourselves in position to capitalize on some stage points and see where you are at the end and hopefully do the same thing we did tonight and be up front and have a chance to win. Q. How did you feel the traction compound‑‑ how much did it affect the race, and did it do what you expected? KEVIN HARVICK: I really liked the way that the track raced tonight because you could really maneuver on the bottom. I thought that the first two races were just way too bottom heavy as far as the racetrack went, and that top lane never came in. Tonight you could race all over the racetrack. When you had a lap car high, you could shoot to the bottom, and when you had somebody low you could shoot high. You had a lot of options, and as a driver that's really what you want. Q. What do you think is the bigger impact of your win; is it the five bonus points that you get or keeping Kyle from getting five bonus points and him having to start this next round in a hole? KEVIN HARVICK: I think the biggest thing is I get to keep this sword. I'm more excited about that. Q. In regards to lap traffic, Kyle wasn't happy with a couple of those cars, and if you look at it, the recurring lapped cars, there were a couple really toward the back of the field that were dozens and dozens and dozens of laps down. Since you've been around for almost two decades, have you ever seen this much of a disparity in terms of strength of field and competitive gap between those cars that are competing for wins and championships and those who are just‑‑ KEVIN HARVICK: I would definitely suggest that you probably go back and watch some races from the '70s‑‑ '60s, '70s, '80s. There will be a ton of cars a lap down. Q. A lot was made about the cushion that you had entering the playoffs, but you proved quickly that you didn't even need to worry about using the cushion, capturing two wins in this first round. How important is it for you to stay consistent throughout the playoffs like you did in this opening round? KEVIN HARVICK: Yeah, I think for us you just want to keep doing what you're doing. You don't want to get out of rhythm, you don't want to start thinking about what could happen or what did happen. You just go and do what you do on a week‑to‑week basis, climb in the car drive it as hard as you can. The guys are going to put what they think is the best setup in the car for that particular week, and everybody wants to achieve the same goal, so nobody is trying to have a bad night or a slow car. Everybody is coming to the racetrack trying to do everything that we can, but the thing I can tell you is when things aren't going 100 percent correctly on a race weekend, we've got a great group of guys on pit road, we've got a great group of guys back at home helping us and on the pit box and doing all the things that it takes to try to climb back in the race or strategize our way back in the race. Sometimes those weeks, and I think Darlington is a great example of that, we just kept ourselves in the race and wound up in a position that capitalized on winning the race so that we weren't really in contention to win. You just want to stay in rhythm. It's kind of like basketball or football and you look at the teams that get the first‑week bye and then they go to the next week and it always makes me wonder if you wouldn't just rather keep playing to stay in that rhythm because I know for us staying in the rhythm and just thinking the same way that we have all year is the best way to do it for us. Q. Kevin, a lot of people want to look at the second round and talk about all the potential pitfalls. You've always talked about looking just one race ahead of time, and I'm curious, how did you get that approach? How tough was it to kind of focus on in this playoff system where it can be easy to get wrapped up? And do you see other people getting wrapped up with, oh, look, here's Talladega, here's the Roval, here's all these bad things that can happen, I‑have‑to‑do‑more‑in‑Vegas type of thing? KEVIN HARVICK: I think for us, you just don't want to read anything that's happening in the sport, honestly, at this particular time of the year. You just want to keep your mind as clear as possible. We've made a decision of how we want to think and what we want to talk about and pay attention to, and it's us. I know that sounds selfish, but the thing that I can tell you is it's way less mentally exhausting than worrying about where you need to have a good race and where you need to have a bad race. It's how do we get the most out of this week, and once you start the race, it's okay, what do we need to do to our car, are we good, are we bad, where do we need to work and just try to be productive and proactive of thinking towards what we need to do next. I don't have the capacity to think more than one week ahead anyway, and trying to overthink things just takes way too much space in my brain for me to function during the week. Q. Nine wins, you're close to ten. I talked to you about this when you got to eight. A ten‑win season is just unbelievable, and now you may be on the threshold of that. I wonder how you feel about that, and how do you feel about this being maybe your greatest season ever at age 44? KEVIN HARVICK: Well, I love that it's in the conversation of being the greatest season ever because you look at the sport's gurus that don't know a lot about racing, they put these graphs up and talk about where your peak seasons are, where you're good, where you're bad. Where you're good is where you have the best results, and fortunately for me, they're coming right now. I've been fortunate to be surrounded by a great group of people that have the same commitment to doing the things that I like to do, and that's race cars and try to do it at a very high level. I'm just fortunate to be able to still be doing this for 20 years now and be successful, and we got to nine, so that's one step closer than we were at eight. I don't know if we'll make it to ten, but we're going to keep trying to do the best we can every week, and it's just been an unbelievable year. Q. You guys have enjoyed a lot of success under some very trying and difficult circumstances this season, but during the last couple months you've also been doing it while Keelan has started his racing career. I just wondered how you dealt with operating under the circumstances of racing right now while also trying to be race car driver dad? KEVIN HARVICK: Yeah, well, I think it's actually helped me because a couple questions ago talking about this track and that track, it's actually made me not have time to pay attention to any of it. It's pretty much been the go‑kart stuff and family and this, and that's it. That's all I've got time for. I stood in the rain on Thursday and we rode around the racetrack on Thursday, stood in the rain Friday. He did a great job, lost by a couple inches today. I know he was bummed out about that, but I think as you look at that, I've got to get up at 6:00 in the morning and take him to race two more. It's really helped my enthusiasm for racing in general because I see his excitement towards the things that we're doing together, and there's really just‑‑ you're not going to go play basketball or baseball or anything like that because it's not something that we can go do, and kind of be in our little corner, in our own trailer and kind of keep ourselves distanced from everybody else. Seeing not only Keelan but seeing the enthusiasm that those young kids have for trying to learn how to race and being at the racetrack and being around and watching the other kids and their dads and interacting from dad to driver and just see his progression and the way that he's become better and more in tune with what's going on has been a lot of fun for me. It's actually just really kind of made me focus on just more‑‑ there's more time than I think about racing. It's not just here, it's there, and I think that that's basically what my whole life has been around. There was a time period there where you're like, man, I don't want him to race, I don't want him to do this, and then you see that step back into go‑karts, and I remember all the great times that we had at the racetrack. And now you're experiencing those things, and you've got mom and sister and we can travel as a family, and it's really reminded me how great racing is and how much of a family sport it really is. So it's been fun. THE MODERATOR: Kevin, thank you for taking the time to talk with us. Congratulations on another win, and we'll see you at Las Vegas. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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