Harvick just wants to be a Contender

KEVIN HARVICK'S predicament would keep some race car drivers awake nights. Basically, Harvick has to win Sunday's scheduled AAA 400 NASCAR Sprint Cup race at Dover International Speedway to advance to the Contenders Round of the Chase.

After two Chase races, the defending champion is 15th in points, 23 behind the cutoff line for advancing. If he wins his first Cup race in his 30th start at the Delaware race track, he'll be one of 12 Contenders. Otherwise, Harvick has to points hop over three drivers to qualify as a Contender.

"I like these types of situations, I think they're different and fun and it's all in the approach and how you react to them," a confident Harvick said yesterday on a conference call.

Comparing Chase pressure to his 2001 Cup series debut, driving Dale Earnhardt's No. 3 Chevrolet after Earnhardt was killed in a racing accident at Daytona, Harvic said, "For me personally, these things are kind of a walk in the park compared to the Earnhardt situations of taking over his car and having to deal with that and all the things that we dealt with back in 2001. It kind of makes these scenarios a little bit easier to deal with because you've dealt with things that are on a much bigger scale than the current things of just performing on the race track."

Harvick and his No. 4 Chevy team are trying to focus on a business-as-usual approach this weekend.

"It's really no different than how we would approach any other week," the 39-year-old Californian said. "Obviously, we have been in this position before, so it's really no different, other than the circumstances with the points and the championship and everything that goes with it. But as far as an approach standpoint, we'll do everything exactly the same."

Even though Harvick has never won at Dover, his recent races at the "Monster Mile" have been monster-ish. In this year's spring race Harvick led 91 laps and finished second to his "pal" Jimmie Johnson. Last fall, pole-sitter Harvick paced the most laps, 223, and finished third.

"It's been a really good race track for us, performance-wise, over the last year and a half," Harvick said. "We have had a couple of freak things happen with the lug nut knocking the valve stem off a couple of times at the same race track. But (we) led a bunch of laps and (are) looking forward to the challenge this weekend."

In this year's Chase opener Sept. 18 at Chicagoland, Johnson slammed into the driver's side of Harvick's car on a restart, causing damage that led to Harvick spinning and crashing. He finished 42nd. Afterward, when Johnson tried to talk about the incident, Harvick shoved the six-time champion.

Asked on yesterday's call if the two drivers had communicated since Chicagoland, Harvick replied, "As a team, we have moved onto Dover."

Following up, I said, "I take it you haven't, and you have no to plans to communicate." Harvick: "We're just concentrating on things that we need to right now."

Prior to last Sunday's Chase race at New Hampshire, Jeff Gordon offered his take on Harvick vs. Johnson, Gordon's Hendrick Motorsports teammate.

"I think we all agree that maybe Jimmie should have waited a little bit longer before he approached Kevin," Gordon said. "When I look at Jimmie, his sincerity of trying to patch things up with somebody I believe he respects on the track and try to at least give his side of it is admirable. It just maybe was off on the timing.

"Then I can completely understand the frustration and anger that would be built up in a situation like that. I can't see where (Harvick) did anything wrong. He tried to restart and didn't get as good of a restart as he wanted. (Johnson) got inside of him and he was holding his ground and they made contact. It was a racing incident, in my opinion.''

Joey Logano is in excellent position in the Chase, tied with Carl Edwards for third place. When Logano isn't focusing on racing, he's involved with his foundation and its Chasing Second Chances program.

The Joey Logano Foundation is awarding grants to charities in Chase race markets to raise awareness for the dedicated non-profits answering the call to make their community a better place to live.

In Dover, Logano is partnering with Elder Heart/Mission 22, a national awareness campaign drawing attention to the 22 U.S. military veterans who commit suicide each day as a result of post-traumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injury.

Elder Heart and the foundation plan to create a statue in honor of retired U.S. Army Staff Sgt. Michelle Langhorst, one of the 22 lost on March 30. The 10-foot statue of Langhorst's silhouette will be tentatively unveiled at the track during the spring 2016 Dover race. The foundation will make a $15,000 donation for creation and shipping of the statue.

"Bringing awareness to it is very important," Logano said. "I can't imagine some of the situations they are in. They fight for our freedom, so we should help them as much as we can.''