HOMESTEAD, Fla. – Kevin Harvick won eight times in 2018 but was not able to secure a second career Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series championship.
Harvick led a race-high 102 laps in Sunday’s Ford EcoBoost 400 season finale at Homestead-Miami Speedway. But he fell back from the lead on a late-race restart and took the checkered flag third behind winner and champion Joey Logano and Martin Truex Jr.
“Yeah, we had a daytime race car,” Harvick said of the changing track conditions. “As soon as it got dark we never could get our car tightened up there at the end, and then they made a great call to put us in position to win the race, and then the caution came out when the 2 (Brad Keselowski) car spun the 19 (Daniel Suarez) out and came off pit road fourth, and just our strong point was not the restarts tonight, and wound up on the wrong side of it.”
Harvick said his Stewart-Haas Racing Ford was strong earlier in the race but felt a change when darkness set in around the 1.5-mile track that did not allow him to challenge for the lead.
“Just the balance was really good until it was dark outside, and we just never could get the rear grip back to where we needed to, and I couldn’t take off,” Harvick explained. “But like I say, they put us in a position to win if the caution didn’t come out, and we had a shot there with I don’t even know, what was there, 18 laps to go when the caution came out. It’s just the way it all shook out, the 22 (Logano) could take off really good.”
Harvick was quick to point out despite not winning the title he was proud of the season’s accomplishments.
“This was a good year,” he said.
