While he was kicking everyone’s hind end at Atlanta Motor Speedway on Sunday, Kevin Harvick also delivered a larger message.The old dogs still know the most tricks.A day after leading 141 laps of a 163-lap Xfinity Series race, Harvick dominated Sunday’s Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series race to the tune of 181 laps led and a margin of victory of nearly 3 seconds.
And he was in good, old company at the front of the field, as well. Thirty-four-year-old Brad Keselowski was second, 38-year-old Clint Bowyer was third, 37-year-old Denny Hamlin fourth and 37-year-old Martin Truex Jr. was fifth.
All those drivers have at least 10 years’ Cup experience. And including Harvick in 2014 and Truex last year, each of the last five Cup champions has been at that length tenure or greater.
As evidenced by all the racing water cooler talk after Austin Dillon and Darrell Wallace Jr. finished 1-2 at Daytona last week, the young guns might be the craze right now, but this is still a veteran’s series.
It wasn’t a surprise to see a veteran like Harvick crush the field at Atlanta. With an old, worn-out surface that’s tough on tires, AMS definitely is a “driver’s track.” And besides that, the quad-oval has been Harvick’s personal playground for the past several years.
Sure, he hadn’t won there since 2001 in just his third career series start, but Harvick has dominated the place since joining Stewart-Haas Racing in 2014. His laps led there in that span — 195 that year, 116 in 2015, 131 in 2016 and 292 in last year’s stunning defeat — tell the tale.
Other drivers talked on FOX’s broadcast about watching Harvick’s line at Atlanta extensively. But they still haven’t figured out whatever he knows about that track.
Harvick’s win wasn’t just a personal manifesto, either. It was part of a Sunday performance that looked awfully good for Ford.
Harvick, Keselowski and Bowyer completed the 1-2-3 sweep for the manufacturer. New points leader Joey Logano (sixth) and Kurt Busch (eighth, 52 laps led) made it five in the top 10 and second-place points man Ryan Blaney (12th) and near-Daytona 500 winner Aric Almirola (13th) also sewed up nice finishes at the Blue Oval.
Somehow, Ford, with the Fusion being the oldest body style in the series, gained some ground on the Toyotas over the offseason — (The new inspection process, perhaps? Truex was busted multiple times and lost his car chief to an ejection before holding out of the qualifying session.) — and seems to be a step ahead of the new Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 at this point.
The bigwigs at Ford have to be hoping for a repeat performance this weekend at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, a place where Ford won the first three Cup races and nine of 20 all-time — most recently by Keselowski in 2016.
But in a Cup garage that’s never content, that’ll definitely be easier said than done.