The fifth race of the 2019 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series will feature the full new rules package including the aero ducts last used at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. Even with practice on Friday, what will happen in race conditions appears to be anybody’s guess.
“No clue,” Harvick answered when asked what to expect.
Harvick is off to a solid start this season although he has yet to visit Victory Lane. This time a year ago, the Stewart-Haas Racing driver was in the midst of a three-race winning streak. While Harvick isn’t making any excuses, he does believe the rules package and its various incarnations used through the first five races of the season have given teams a challenge.
“I think we are seeing some of the unintended consequences of this package because it is a lot of work,” Harvick said. “It isn’t what everybody expected form the testing with the drafting and low drag and things you are prepared for. The aero balance and all the things that come with that. For us, I feel like we have had top five, top three cars the last three weeks. They are just not quite winning cars.
“I think as you look at it, I think we have just raced a superspeedway package we aren’t going to race anymore. A package at Atlanta that we might not race much and then the last two weeks. You have had cars all over the country. It is really just a survival game at this point trying to keep up with the schedule. We are learning at such a rapid pace right now that the changes to the car will be extreme by the time you get to Texas.”
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Harvick has been good at the two-mile track over the course of his Cup career. He has a 10.2 average finish over his last ten races at ACS, which includes a win in 2011. While the impact of the rules package continues to be a work in progress, Harvick believes leaning on past experience is still the best way to find performance.
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“Experience is always going to matter, especially here,” he said. “The cars are faster than I thought they would be here.
“This place is going to put on a good race. You can just run all over the race track. You can put slow cars, fast cars, low downforce and high downforce and this track is going to be racy. It should be fun.”
