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In The Know – Dover

NASCAR CUP SERIES OVERVIEW:

●  Event:  Würth 400 (Round 11 of 36)

●  Time/Date:  2 p.m. EDT on Sunday, April 30

●  Location:  Dover (Del.) Mot or Speedway

●  Layout:  1-mile, concrete oval

●  Laps/Miles:  400 laps/400 miles

●  Stage Lengths:  Stage 1: 120 laps / Stage 2: 130 laps / Final Stage: 150 laps

●  TV/Radio:  FS1 / PRN / SiriusXM NASCAR Radio

SHR FAST FACTS:

Kevin Harvick: 

Harvick has three NASCAR Cup Series wins at Dover. In addition to the aforementioned victories in May 2018 and August 2020, Harvick won his first Dover race in October 2015. Harvick provided a prelude to that win by finishing second when the series raced at the 1-mile, concrete oval five months earlier for the FedEx 400.

Aric Almirola: 

In Almirola’s previous 18 Cup Series starts at Dover, he has two top-five finishes, four top-10s, and he’s led 86 laps. He and the No. 10 Smithfield Ford Mustang team have come oh so close to hoisting the trophy at Dover in the Cup Series. In the fall 2018 race there, he started 11th and gradually made his way into the lead by the final stage. He led a total of 64 laps before a late caution, but contact with the wall while racing aggressively in the closing laps ruined his victory bid and left him with a 13th-place finish. It was the first time the Tampa, Florida, native led laps in the Cup Series on the concrete mile oval

Chase Briscoe:

Briscoe has two Cup Series starts at Dover with a best finish of 13th earned in last year’s event at the concrete mile oval. The No. 14 Mahindra Tractors team finished inside the top-15 in eight of 10 events on tracks measuring 1 mile or less during the 2022 season. The only time Briscoe finished outside the top-15 was when he spun on the last lap of the Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway dirt race while challenging for the lead, and when his car caught on fire at Richmond (Va.) Raceway in August while running in the top-10.

Ryan Preece:  

Preece is coming into his own this season, showing speed on a variety of tracks the series has visited and running up front during multiple events. He had a career weekend at Martinsville (Va.) Speedway a few weeks ago, winning his first Cup Series pole and leading a career-high 135 laps. Preece and the No. 41 team suffered a pit road speeding penalty that ultimately set them back for the remainder of the race. Preece was credited with a 15th-place finish there.

OUR WEEKLY WRAPS:

 

WHAT OUR DRIVERS ARE SAYING:

Kevin Harvick Driver of the No. 4 Hunt Brothers Pizza/Realtree Ford Mustang: 

You have three NASCAR Cup Series wins at Dover and 23 top-10s. Is there something specific about Dover that augments your driving style?

“Dover is a racetrack that everything about it is unique. The concrete, itself, all the way around the racetrack, is unique. Dover is a racetrack where you can get away with being aggressive every single lap. You have to drive the car as hard as it will go every single lap, and that’s hard to do there because there are all the little bumps that come with the concrete, the change of elevation as you go in and off the corners, and all the banking in the corners – it’s just a really, really fast racetrack. It’s also a very physical racetrack just because of all the G’s and the bouncing and everything that comes with driving around Dover. It’s a racetrack where you have to have your hands gripping on the steering wheel and gritting your teeth all at the same time in order to go fast every single lap. When your car’s off, there’s just nowhere to hide there. You wind up going a lap down, probably two laps down, because you pit early and then the caution comes out. It’s a beast of a racetrack and there’s a reason they call it the Monster Mile because you can get yourself in trouble really quick.”

Aric Almirola Driver of the No. 10 Smithfield Ford Mustang: 

Do you enjoy going to Dover?

“I love Dover. It’s the home of my first NASCAR national series win in the East Series, and then I went back there and won in a truck, and I’ve always run really well there in the Xfinity and Cup Series, so I really enjoy going to Dover. A racecar driver is always fond of a place they’re successful at, so having success at Dover is a big part of why I love to go there, and then the racetrack is just a very unique track. It’s the only track we go to where the sensation of speed is really high. A lot of the tracks we go to, we know we’re going fast but it doesn’t feel that fast when you get adapted to it. But at Dover, you really feel like you’re riding a rollercoaster and you get that sensation of speed.”

Chase Briscoe Driver of the No. 14 Mahindra Tractors Ford Mustang: 

You have a Miles the Monster trophy. Where does it rank in terms of the trophies you’ve earned?:

“The Dover trophy and win are near the top. The first race of the weekend on Saturday was not an easy one for us. We were so fast and we didn’t have the result to go with it. I think there was a little more determination when we got there on Sunday to redeem ourselves and, like I said, you aren’t just getting handed a trophy at Dover. The whole team put in a lot of effort to get us to victory lane that day. We had a lot of big wins in 2020, but that one ranks pretty high on the list.”

Ryan Preece Driver of the No. 41 Mohawk Northeast Ford Mustang: 

You have experience at Dover in your career and you ran the Cup race at the track last season, does that give you any leverage?

“I really enjoy Dover and one of the best parts of it is that it’s a little bit closer to home for me. There’s a sense of familiarity and I love coming from the northeast, so I get excited about heading up there for Dover and other tracks in the area. This is actually a race that I’ve been stressing to Chad (Johnston, crew chief) about. I really felt like we had such a great race car last year. We just never got track position, and we actually had a tire go down a couple times. Then, I believe, when AJ (Allmendinger) lost a tire during the green flag pit cycle, we lost a lap or two and it just kind of put a damper on our day. But from a speed standpoint, we were really fast in practice and had a great race car. I feel like some of the baseline of what we decided to take for this weekend strongly goes off that, and I have high expectations.”