SHR driver ready for the challenge of defending his title
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CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Turning the well-worn saying on its ear, the head that wears the crown is not heavy for Kevin Harvick, who enters the 2015 season with all sorts of burden removed from his shoulders. The nickname "Happy" still fits, but the description of "relaxed" also seems to apply.
Harvick’s pressure-free composure, on prime display Tuesday afternoon during the Stewart-Haas Racing portion of the Charlotte Motor Speedway Media Tour, has plenty to do with the title of reigning NASCAR Sprint Cup Series champion after 13 years of coming up just short. But the lighter load is also equal parts being free of the controlled maelstrom from the offseason a year ago as SHR assembled the parts and pieces that made up the championship-caliber No. 4 team.
For the here and now, Harvick was grateful that his first title meant no further questions about whether this would be his year.
"The pressure’s definitely off," Harvick said. "There’s not that pressure of being that guy who was so close to winning championships and had not won one. To be able to accomplish that and take that pressure off is a really good thing because that’s really what we wanted to accomplish in coming over to Stewart-Haas Racing. So to be fortunate enough to be able to do that is definitely a sense of relief, and now you’ve been through it, you understand it, you know the feelings, the emotions and the things that you’ve been through, and hopefully that leads to that chest full of experience that you carry around with you to just put another tool in that chest to hopefully win more."
Making the leap from the familiar turf from Richard Childress Racing, where he spent the first 13 years of his premier-series career, came with some initial gnashing of teeth but his enthusiasm for showing up to work each day had grown stagnant. Joining SHR eventually bore fruit with plenty of rejuvenating qualities, but Harvick first had to prepare himself for the jump in to the unknown.
"I didn’t want to be comfortable," Harvick said. "I wanted to experience what we experienced last year, and sometimes you have to make some bold or hard decisions in order to make things like this happen. So for me, I’m as comfortable as I’ve ever been."
For starters, Harvick won’t have to deal with the same amount of change — borne of necessity — that the team had ahead of the 2014 campaign. Partnering a new driver with new crew chief Rodney Childers during a time when the organization was expanding to a four-car operation could have stalled the process of building chemistry on the No. 4 team. It didn’t — the combination produced its first victory in just the second race of the season.
With all the parts still in place, it’s a combination that team co-owner Gene Haas has no intention of tampering with.
"He just won the championship. We’ve basically frozen the team as it is," Haas said. "So we’ve got something that works and we’re going to treat it very, very delicately and try to repeat that. There’s no use tempting fate."
One thing out of the organization’s control in the change department is the new rules package for 2015. A crucial cog to the No. 4 team’s march to the title was how well it adapted to last year’s rules package, spearheaded by the work Childers put into making that fateful December 2013 test a smashing success at the Charlotte track.
Will the new rules package throw Harvick and Co. a curve ball? In a statement that could have the competition on edge, Childers said the changes might actually benefit the team since something similar to the 2015 package was one of the test configurations that suited the car the most.
Even with that institutional knowledge in tow, Childers — one of the most relaxed workaholics in the garage — isn’t ready to adopt Harvick’s pressure-free approach.
"I don’t really feel that way at all. I mean, I always feel like my job’s on the line every single day and either you can go in there and work hard or someone else is going to take your job," Childers said. "I try to be the first one at the shop and the last one to leave, work as hard as I can while I’m there and hopefully that’ll constantly pay off as long as the years go on."
With one title under his belt, the immediate task ahead of Harvick is focusing on a repeat. The pressure might be off for now, but it certainly wasn’t the case during the elimination phases of the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup playoffs, which debuted its new format last year.
Harvick responded to the intensity by turning up the wick and winning the last two races of the season to wrap up his first title. His approach might have changed in terms of the pressure, but Harvick said his aggressive nature on the track certainly won’t.
"It’s definitely going to be a challenge, as it is every year, and obviously there’s some different rules and everything that comes along with that this year as far as the engine," Harvick said, "but I think the one thing we did learn through the last half of the year is I think everybody figured out that winning a race and being aggressive is the most preferable method in order to win a championship."
