Trigger Warning for Kevin Harvick Fans
NASCAR Championship 4
- Joey Logano
- Kyle Busch
- Martin Truex Jr.
- Kevin Harvick (unfortunately)
Phoenix Recap
NASCAR has seen some great races in the second half of the season and this last weekend at ISM Raceway in Phoenix was no exception. After Kevin Harvick led the first 72 laps of Stage 1, a flat tire forced him to come to pit road which was closed. This caused him to start from the tail of the field to begin Stage 2 as well as losing a lap and Chase Elliott winning stage 1.
This tightened up the playoff field as Harvick, who started the race with a 3 point lead for a spot in the Championship next weekend, would now have to fight his way back into contention against Kurt Busch, Aric Almirola and Elliott. In Stage 2, Kurt Busch was penalized for passing the pace car before entering pit road which put him a lap down at the end of the next stage. As Kurt Busch was leading with only 44 laps left of the 312 in the Can-Am 500, Denny Hamlin caused a wreck that took Kurt Busch and Chase Elliott out of the Championship contention. Although Aric Almirola gave a solid effort at the end of the race, he finished 4th and allowed for Kevin Harvick to earn his spot in the NASCAR Championship 4 at Homestead-Miami this weekend.
Kevin Harvick Penalized
All the drama began last week after Kevin Harvick was penalized due to his car failing the R&D inspection. NASCAR inspectors discovered an alteration in Harvick’s spoiler which resulted in an L1 penalty. This meant that Harvick lost his automatic qualification spot in the Championship race that he earned from his win the weekend prior in Texas. Harvick was forced to use Tony Gibson as his interim crew chief as the Stewart-Hass Racing No. 4 crew chief Rodney Childers was suspended for the remainder of the season as well as car chief Robert Smith.
NASCAR has only been using this playoff system since 2014 which means it’s fairly new in terms of professional sports. Due to this fact, NASCAR still seems to be working out kinks in their system. It’s nothing new for a race team to do everything they can within the parameters of the NASCAR rules to try and gain any advantage they can over the competition, especially with a championship on the line. That being said, an L1 penalty is one of the most severe penalty NASCAR can handout. Even if it was just a spoiler alteration, NASCAR clearly judged what Harvick and his team did to be very serious.
Regardless of the severity of the penalty, NASCAR felt it was only necessary to revoke Harvick’s automatic Championship spot and dock him 40 playoff points. This meant Harvick was still 4th in the playoffs to advance to the Championship 4 and still allowed a chance for him to earn his spot once again at the racetrack where he holds the most wins of any cup driver, Phoenix. Sure, this technically allowed for the other playoff drivers to have another chance to earn a spot in the Championship race but with Kyle Busch and Martin Truex Jr. nearly unreachable, the odds were heavily stacked against the field.
Kevin Harvick Should Have Been Disqualified
Although the playoff rules are still evolving, NASCAR has clear penalties that every driver and team are aware of. If an L1 penalty is so sever, it deserves the most sever consequences. In my opinion, Kevin Harvick should have never even been in a position to still compete for a Championship spot. His team knowingly broke a rule and they should have been properly punished for it. Without a specific playoff punishment in place, surely NASCAR saw an opportunity to allow for one of the most popular drivers to remain in the Championship 4.
Based on his entire season’s performance, Kevin Harvick clearly deserved a spot in the championship race. With this major infraction however, who’s to say this was his first time racing with an illegal car? If the MLB was in fact juicing balls last year like they were accused of, would they have disqualified the Dodgers from the World Series? Probably not because there wasn’t a clear rule on the books stating that as the punishment. If the Dodgers were caught using steroids however, they might have been. My point is, NASCAR should have set a standard with this infraction and used Harvick as an example of the severity of cheating during the playoffs.
Do Better Next Time, NASCAR
This is all hindsight of course as Harvick is now in the Championship 4 but NASCAR should not allow for something like this to happen again. I hope NASCAR learns for this mistake and begins enforcing a proper punishment for an L1 penalty during the playoffs, championship disqualification.
Until then, race fans are forced to watch some of the most hated NASCAR drivers compete for the Championship. To make matters worse, we will still have to hear from the obnoxious Harvick fans. I for one will be cheering on Truex Jr. to get one final championship for Furniture Row Racing before he turns to the dark side of Joe Gibbs Racing.
