Kevin Harvick didn’t have the quickest car at Daytona and struggled against an overheating problem that dropped him back into the murkier zones of the whirling dervish pack, but what he did have was the right move up his sleeve at the crucial moment.
He grasped American racing’s biggest prize away from one of its best-loved racers, Mark Martin, in brilliant – yet controversial – style.
Harvick’s sensational final lap move dashed the dreams of Martin, the now part-time Cup veteran who once again had to settle for being the bridesmaid. He’s never won this race, or the championship, but Martin put himself in a position to win after gambling on taking only two tires in his final pitstop.
He always looked prone to attack from constant challenger Kyle Busch’s Hendrick Chevrolet, which had taken fresh rubber all-round, but his true opposition was coming from much further back in the field.
Mark Martin leads Kyle Busch on the last restart
Photo by: Eric Gilbert
Busch had moved ominously into second place as the race entered its endgame, and was challenging Martin for the lead with four laps remaining when a multi-car accident caused a red flag, leading to a two-lap green/white-checkered race to the flag.
“We can win this thing,” Martin told his crew over the radio as he sat waiting for the restart, while Busch’s crew chief Alan Gustafson pointed out bluntly to his charge: “We’ve got four new tires; he’s only got two.”
Having led briefly in the first half of the race, Harvick appeared to be out of the frame after his car received a bang on its nose that sent the water temperatures sky high. Fortunately, the team was able to rectify its cooling duct in a pitstop, and from 29th with 22 laps to go, he rallied his way back into seventh place for the crucial restart.
The racing had been positively restrained by NASCAR restrictor plate racing standards, but it was just about to get a whole lot wilder. As the evening turned to twilight, and with the ultimate bragging rights of the year at stake, as one driver put it: “The risk versus reward ratio changes and people do things they wouldn’t normally do.” Or, as Harvick put it: “A bunch of demons came out when it got dark.”
Mark Martin leads Kyle Busch with one lap to go
Photo by: Eric Gilbert
As the crowd took to their feet, Martin made a solid getaway and hugged the yellow line at the bottom of the track forcing Busch to follow him as the…
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