Harvick rules at PIR by mere inches

Kevin Harvick didn’t have the greatest of qualifying efforts at Phoenix International Raceway in the Good Sam 500 on March 13. Even with five wins in his previous six visits to the 1-mile oval, the task of coming to the front from the middle of the field was formidable.

For Harvick, the challenge turned out to be a piece of cake, even with having to survive a heart-wrenching finish.
Harvick led 139 of the 312 laps and outmaneuvered Carl Edwards at the finish line to win for the sixth time in the last eight races at Phoenix and become the fourth different race winner in the 2016 season.
And even though Harvick – who qualified 18th – and Edwards were two of only four drivers who led laps all day, the second photo-finish in the first four races of the season had everyone talking afterwards. It came courtesy of a two-lap shootout after Kasey Kahne wrecked at lap 308, four short of the finish.
Harvick got a jump off the restart, but Edwards got his No. 19 Toyota down to the low side of the track on the white-flag lap. Edwards gave Harvick a shove up the hill, but when the No. 4 car bumped back, it was enough to get the victory – by just one-hundredth of a second.
“Fun finish,” said Harvick, who won for the eighth time in his career at PIR. “I think as drivers and as a sport, that's really the benefit -- one of the benefits of the low downforce package and the tire situation.”
The driver of the Jimmy John’s Chevrolet for Stewart-Haas Racing didn’t lead for the first time until lap 169, but he held on to it for all but six of the remaining circuits. When the last of the race’s five caution flags came out, it gave Edwards the chance he was looking for after finishing 18th at Las Vegas last week.
“Just a lot of fun,” Edwards said of the finish. “I really wish it would have worked out a little bit differently, but it's a good race. I ran into (Harvick) about as hard as I thought I could without wrecking him, and it ended up being a drag race.”
With the low-downforce package providing more than enough brain drains for crew chiefs and drivers alike, Harvick knows the process of figuring it all out hasn’t even begun to take shape with the season only four weeks old.
“It's a totally different mentality in practice right now,” Harvick said. “It's not about how fast you go, it's really about how long can you go fast and trying to get the falloff in the car to stay where it needs to be.”
On a warm, sunny afternoon in the desert, Harvick and the No. 4 crew got everything figured out just in time and just enough.
Among the 10 closest race finishes in NASCAR history, Harvick has now been involved in two of them. He beat Jeff Gordon by .006 to win at Atlanta Motor Speedway on March 11, 2001.
Follow Tom Zulewski on Twitter @Tomzsports.

NEXT WEEK'S RACES

Auto Club Speedway (2-mile superspeedway), Fontana, California

-SPRINT CUP: Auto Club 400, Sunday, 3:30 p.m. ET/12:30 p.m. PT, Fox (check listings). Radio: SiriusXM Channel 90 or your local MRN affiliate.

Race distance: 400 miles, 200 laps

2015 champion: Brad Keselowski

-XFINITY SERIES: Treatmyclot.com 300, Saturday, 4 p.m. ET/1 p.m. PT, Fox Sports 1. Radio: SiriusXM Channel 90 or your local MRN affiliate.

Race distance: 300 miles, 150 laps.

2015 champion: Kevin Harvick

-CAMPING WORLD TRUCK SERIES: Off until April 2 at Martinsville Speedway.

Side note: Other than Daytona, when he was basically told not to compete, Kyle Busch has been otherworldly in his dominance at Atlanta, Las Vegas and Phoenix.

He hasn't just won all three, but he's crushed the field and made them eat brake dust for dinner.

How good is the driver with 79 wins in 314 starts in NASCAR's No. 2 series? This good...

Out of 563 laps run in the last three weeks, Busch has led 493. That's 87.6 percent of the total.

Between Las Vegas and Phoenix, the ratio is 374 out of 400, or 93.5 percent.

In past posts here, I've argued how all the winning Busch has done in XFINITY and trucks hasn't meant squat without a Cup championship. Now that the Cup trophy is in the case, Busch is making the track his own personal playground.

While those who don't care for Busch are crying sour grapes, it's a tired, stale act. Instead of complaining about things like limiting how often Cup guys can run in the lower series, it's about time we appreciate what Busch is doing.

In order to be the best, you have to beat the best. Everyone in the XFINITY garage recognizes that. It's about time the fans do the same.

Another item I have to confess here: I had a three-way viewing/listening experience Sunday between the NCAA Tournament selection show on my computer, an additional Facebook tab, and the race from Phoenix on my SiriusXM app.

The early ratings showed NASCAR came within an eyelash of beating the selection show for viewing audience, 3.7 to 3.6. CBS tried to expand to two hours for the first time. It was a dull, lifeless experience.

Not so from the finish at Phoenix. The excitement came when it mattered, and it's continued a trend of great finishes through the first four weeks.

As long as the racing keeps going like it has been, interest in NASCAR will continue to grow in 2016. Maybe not back to the level it was at the turn of the millenium, but at least on an upward trend.