Closing ability eludes Harvick's team

Seven times this season, Harvick has captured the No. 1 qualifying position, the most by a driver since Mark Martin won seven poles in 2009.

He’s led the most laps eight times, more than any other driver, including more than 1,000 since his most recent victory in April at Darlington Raceway.

But given the way his season has unfolded, fast cars haven’t produced the desired results often enough for Harvick and company.

Sunday’s AAA 400 at Dover International Speedway was the latest example in how quickly things can go wrong in a Sprint Cup Series race for the team, and how quirky some of those things can be.

For the second time this year at Dover, a broken inner valve stem led to a flat tire for Harvick, and the driver that led 223 laps of the 400-lap race was never to see the front of the field again.

The tire problem surfaced after an initial front-end issue bit the team — reports said it was a broken front shock.

The first setback failed to derail his hopes of returning to the winner’s circle, but the timing of the flat tire proved to be too much to overcome.

It’s been that kind of year for the 38-year-old, a winner in three of this year’s first eight races but a disappointing 0-for-summer.

The driver that should already be expanding his trophy case has weathered all sorts of problems, both on pit road and underneath the skin of the Stewart-Haas Racing No. 4 Chevrolet.

That Harvick and the team earned a berth in this year’s Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup is a testament to how good the team has been when problems don’t arise. Good enough, also, to advance into the Contender Round (a three-race segment comprised of races at Kansas, Charlotte and Talladega), thanks to finishes of fifth, third and 13th, respectively, at Chicagoland, New Hampshire and Dover.

Championship hopes haven’t dimmed, but the role of favorite currently rests with someone else.

With a return trip to Kansas ahead, Harvick said nothing unexpected after Dover. Going forward, the team expects “to be fast … (we) just have to have some good luck.”

“That is really what it’s all about for us,” he said. “The car will be fast; it’s just about getting it all to come together.”

He likened this year’s series of setbacks to “handing out early Christmas presents to people for winning races that we should be winning.”

Crew chief Rodney Childers, perhaps a bit more blunt, said it’s just a case of “stupid (stuff) happening, and we just have to move on from it.”

“Even with the deal we had going on in the front of the car, we were still the fastest car,” Childers said. “(Kevin) was driving away from them. We just didn’t need the tire to go down and drag the whole front end off of it.”

Jeff Gordon’s team used information gleaned from the No. 4 at Dover, “and won the race,” Childers said, “so I would say we did a pretty good job.”

Alan Gustafson, Gordon’s crew chief, said the winning setup came from a variety of notes and information.

“I wouldn’t say that the information we got from them was any more than normal,” Gustafson said. “They’re obviously very fast, and it’s nice to be able to play off them, and we were able to do that some this weekend.”

But, he added, teammate Jimmie Johnson, a nine-time winner at Dover, is “OK around here” as well.

“We leaned on (Johnson) a little bit. It’s just kind of normal. At the end of the day, we’ve got a lot of resources, and we’ve got to take advantage of it.”

Hendrick Motorsports provides the horsepower and chassis for SHR’s four Sprint Cup teams, as well significant technical information. It is, however, a two-way street, with SHR information made available to the HMS crowd as well.

Harvick isn’t concerned with Gordon or Johnson, or Team Penske teammates Brad Keselowski and Joey Logano, winners of the first two Chase races. His concern and focus go no further than his own team.

“We can beat every car on the race track,” Harvick said. “We just need some good luck.

“If we have some good luck, we’ll win races and have a shot at the championship.”

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