CLINT BOWYER – 2019 Texas I Race Report

Event: O’Reilly Auto Parts 500 (Round 7 of 36)
Series: Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series
Location: Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth (1.5-mile oval)
Format: 334 laps, broken into three stages (85 laps/85 laps/164 laps)
Start/Finish: 25th/2nd (Running, completed 334 of 334 laps)
Point Standing:11th (192 points, 118 out of first)

Race Winner:      Denny Hamlin of Joe Gibbs Racing (Toyota)
Stage 1 Winner:  Joey Logano of Team Penske (Ford)
Stage 2 Winner:  Denny Hamlin of Joe Gibbs Racing (Toyota)

Stage 1 Recap (Laps 1-85):

Clint Bowyer started 25th and finished 15th.
● Bowyer quickly reported his car “was the best it’s been all weekend, boys.”
● Bowyer led laps 80-82 – his first laps led of 2019.
● Gave up the lead when he pitted for fuel with just four laps left in the stage and finished 15th.

Stage 2 Recap (Laps 86-170):

Bowyer started third and finished 11th.
● Bowyer stayed on the track during the stage break and restarted third.
● Fell back to 10th on the restart with a loose car.
● As the stage progressed, Bowyer’s car loosened up and began to climb back to the front.
● During a caution, Bowyer reported a strange battery reading, and the crew tried to determine the cause.
● Bowyer switched between primary and backup battery, and the issue never jeopardized his race.

Stage 3 Recap (Laps 171 -334):

Bowyer started 12th and finished 11th.
● Bowyer began clicking off fast laps again and climbed to fifth by lap 200 and second by lap 224.
● Stayed in the top-three through a pit-stop cycle. Pitted again with 74 to go for two tires and restarted seventh.
● Bowyer raced in second when he and leader Denny Hamlin made fuel-only stops in the closing laps.
● However, Bowyer couldn’t catch Hamlin and finished as runner-up, 2.743 seconds behind.

Notes:

●  Bowyer earned his second top-five of the season and his fourth top-five in 27 career Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series starts at Texas.
●  Bowyer’s second-place result equaled his previous best finish at Texas – second in April 2011.
●  Bowyer led once for three laps to increase his laps-led total at Texas to 88.
●  Denny Hamlin won the O’Reilly Auto Parts 500 to score his 33rd career Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series victory, his second of the season and his third at Texas. His margin of victory over second-place Bowyer was 2.743 seconds.
●  There were five caution periods for a total of 29 laps.
●  Only 15 of the 39 drivers in the O’Reilly Auto Parts 500 finished on the lead lap.
●  Kyle Busch leaves Texas as the championship leader with an eight-point advantage over second-place Hamlin.

Clint Bowyer, driver of the No. 14 Rush Truck Centers/Cummins Ford Mustang:

“All in all, our car handled good. It wasn’t lightning fast all day long, but as they started slip sliding around and struggling we’d kind of prevail on those long runs. That was our M.O. Denny, he was relatively fast all weekend long – top of the sheet – so we just weren’t really. All in all, I’m really happy to finish where we were. What a wild race. Just about the time you think you’re gonna have some stage points the caution would come out and then you thought you were back in and it happened again. Then you’re like, ‘Well, damn. What kind of haymakers are gonna be thrown at the end,’ and it just didn’t. Anytime you finish second it’s like, ‘What could I have done?’ When he came out of the pits that far ahead of us I was like, ‘We’re in big trouble,’ but second is not bad for the way our weekend started.”

Next Up:

The next event on the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series schedule is the Food City 500 on Sunday, April 7 at Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway. The race starts at 2 p.m. EDT with live coverage provided by FS1.

ARIC ALMIROLA – 2019 Texas I Race Report

Event: O’Reilly Auto Parts 500 (Round 7 of 36)
Series: Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series
Location: Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth (1.5-mile oval)
Format: 334 laps, broken into three stages (85 laps/85 laps/164 laps)
Start/Finish: 21st/7th (Running, completed 334 of 334 laps)
Point Standing: 5th (245 points, 65 out of first)

Race Winner: Denny Hamlin of Joe Gibbs Racing (Toyota)
Stage 1 Winner: Joey Logano of Team Penske (Ford)
Stage 2 Winner: Denny Hamlin of Joe Gibbs Racing (Toyota)

Stage 1 Recap (Laps 1-85):

● Aric Almirola started 21st and finished 18th.
● Almirola pitted the No. 10 Smithfield Prime Fresh Ford under caution on lap 14 for fuel only. He was scored 18th off pit road.
● He drove to sixth by lap 78 before pitting for four tires, fuel and air pressure and chassis adjustments.
● Almirola opted not to pit at the conclusion of the stage.

Stage 2 Recap (Laps 86-170):

● Started fifth and finished 12th.
● The No. 10 Ford battled in and around the top-10 during the opening laps.
● Almirola drove as high as ninth and stayed inside the top-10 before pitting on lap 142 for four tires, fuel and adjustments.
● The caution was called on lap 148. Running in 12th place, Almirola took the wave-around to advance to the lead lap.
● He raced just outside the top-10 before the end Stage 2.

Stage 3 Recap (Laps 171-334):

● Started 14th and finished seventh.
● Almirola rallied back to the top-10 in just a few laps when the checkered flag waved to start Stage 3.
● He raced to sixth by lap 215 but noted that if he couldn’t draft or get a push from behind it would be difficult to catch up to any other cars.
● Crew chief Johnny Klausmeier called Almirola to the pits from second place on lap 236 for four tires, fuel and air pressure adjustments. He was scored fourth after green-flag pit stops cycled through.
● After a lap-254 caution, the No. 10 Ford team opted not to pit and advanced to first place.
● He raced inside the top-four and pitted from third place on lap 301 for two right-side tires and fuel.
● After green-flag pit stops cycled through, Almirola raced his way up to seventh to earn his sixth top-10 of the season.

Notes:

●  Almirola earned his sixth top-10 of the season and his third top-10 in 17 career Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series starts at Texas.
●  This was Almirola’s second straight top-10 at Texas.
●  Almirola has finished among the top-10 in every race this year with the exception of the season-opening Daytona 500.
●  Almirola’s six straight top-10s marks a career high. His previous best top-10 streak was four in April-May 2013.
●  Almirola’s seventh-place result equaled his previous best finish at Texas – seventh in April 2013.
●  Almirola led once for three laps – his first laps led at Texas.
●  Denny Hamlin won the O’Reilly Auto Parts 500 to score his 33rd career Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series victory, his second of the season and his third at Texas. His margin of victory over second-place Clint Bowyer was 2.743 seconds.
●  There were five caution periods for a total of 29 laps.
●  Only 15 of the 39 drivers in the O’Reilly Auto Parts 500 finished on the lead lap.
●  Kyle Busch leaves Texas as the championship leader with an eight-point advantage over second-place Hamlin.

Aric Almirola, driver of the No. 10 Smithfield Prime Fresh Ford Mustang for Stewart-Haas Racing:

“I didn’t sleep at all last night with a stomach bug, so I’m really, really depleted. I haven’t been able to keep anything down, so I’m just really hungry and I’m really tired. We don’t get to call in sick. That’s the challenging part of our job occasionally. The flu or a cold or a stomach bug pops up, and you’ve got to fight through it. I’m really proud of everybody on our Smithfield Prime Fresh Ford Mustang. We had a good car and we still got out of here with a top-10, so that’s sixth in a row. I’m proud of that.”

Next Up:

The next event on the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series schedule is the Food City 500 on Sunday, April 7 at Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway. The race starts at 2 p.m. EDT with live coverage provided by FS1.

 

KEVIN HARVICK – 2019 Texas I Race Report

Event:  O’Reilly Auto Parts 500 (Round 7 of 36)
Series:  Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series
Location:  Texas Motor Speedwayin Fort Worth (1.5-mile oval)
Format:  334 laps, broken into three stages (85 laps/85 laps/164 laps)
Start/Finish:  23rd/8th (Running, completed 334 of 334 laps)
Point Standing:  3rd (277 points, 33 out of first)

Race Winner:  Denny Hamlin of Joe Gibbs Racing (Toyota)
Stage 1 Winner:  Joey Logano of Team Penske (Ford)
Stage 2 Winner:  Denny Hamlin of Joe Gibbs Racing (Toyota)

Stage 1 Recap (Laps 1-85):

Harvick started 23rd and finished 16th.
● Climbed to 21st after 10 laps.
● Pitted for fuel only during a caution period on lap 16. Restarted in 16th on lap 18.
● “Loose” was how Harvick described his No. 4 Mobil 1/O’Reilly Auto Parts Ford Mustang on lap 36.
● Harvick radioed on lap 48, “Don’t have enough rear grip,” as his Stewart-Haas Racing teammate Clint Bowyer passed him for 14th.
● Pitted for four tires and fuel on lap 79. Made a slight air pressure adjustment to front tires and added tape to grill opening.
“Splitter is hitting the ground. Vibrates terrible,” said Harvick on lap 83 shortly after the pit stop.
● Stayed out at the end of the stage and gained valuable track position. Was one of only six drivers not to pit.

Stage 2 Recap (Laps 86-170):

Harvick started fourth and finished 16th.
● Jumped up to second place following lap-92 restart. Dropped to sixth by lap 98, but got back to fifth by lap 100 before settling back into sixth a few laps later.
● Made a scheduled, green-flag pit stop on lap 144 for four tires and fuel. Only adjustment was to tire pressures.
● Caution on lap 150 caught Harvick a lap down. He took wave-around to get back on lead lap. Restarted 14th on lap 158.
“Can’t drive it on restarts,” said Harvick on lap 168. “Vibrates so bad I’m out of control on restarts.”
Pitted for four tires and fuel at the end of the stage, with adjustments to left-rear and right-rear wedge.

Stage 3 Recap (Laps 171-334):

Started 18th and finished eighth.
● Uncontrolled tire from pit stop at end of Stage 2 sent Harvick to the tail end of the longest line for lap-177 restart.
● Climbed to 14th by lap 200.
● Rose to seventh by lap 230 as green-flag pit stops cycled through.
Made a scheduled, green-flag pit stop on lap 238 for four tires and fuel with a right-rear wedge adjustment.
● Returned to 14th position by lap 250 after pit-stop cycle had been completed.
● “Too loose. All over the place,” said Harvick on lap 254 while running 14th.
● Took advantage of caution on lap 257 and pitted for four tires and fuel. Restarted 13th on lap 260, but dropped to 15th shortly thereafter.
● Cracked the top-10 on lap 282.
● Last round of green-flag pit stops began on lap 300, allowing Harvick to climb up the leaderboard.
● Pitted under green for fuel only on lap 319. Returned to the track in eighth, and held position through the finish.

Notes:

● Harvick earned his sixth top-10 of the season and his 21st top-10 in 33 career Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series starts at Texas.
● This was Harvick’s 10th straight top-10 at Texas and his 13th top-10 in his last 15 start at Texas.
● Denny Hamlin won the O’Reilly Auto Parts 500 to score his 33rd career Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series victory, his second of the season and his third at Texas. His margin of victory over second-place Bowyer was 2.743 seconds.
● There were five caution periods for a total of 29 laps.
● Only 15 of the 39 drivers in the O’Reilly Auto Parts 500 finished on the lead lap.
● Kyle Busch leaves Texas as the championship leader with an eight-point advantage over second-place Hamlin.

Kevin Harvick, driver of the No. 4 Mobil 1/O’Reilly Auto Parts Ford Mustang for Stewart-Haas Racing:

“Our day was a disaster. Our car drove terrible and that pretty much sums it up.”

Next Up:

The next event on the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series schedule is the Food City 500 on Sunday, April 7 at Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway. The race starts at 2 p.m. EDT with live coverage provided by FS1.

COLE CUSTER – 2019 NXS Texas I Race Report

Date: March 30, 2019
Race Name: My Bariatric Solutions 300 (Race 6 of 33)
Venue: Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth, Texas
Series: NASCAR Xfinity Series
Race Winner: Kyle Busch of Joe Gibbs Racing (Toyota)
Results: Chase Briscoe: 4th  | Cole Custer: 34th
Point Standings:
– Cole Custer: 3rd with 226 points; trails points leader by 42 points
– Chase Briscoe: 11th with 178 points; trails points leader by 90 points

Cole Custer / Jacob Companies Ford Mustang Recap:
– Custer started seventh and finished fourth in Stage 1 to pick up seven stage points.
– The No. 00 Ford started fourth and finished eighth in Stage 2 to pick up an additional three stage points.
– Custer started sixth in the final stage before falling to eighth on lap 92.
– The Jacob Companies Ford returned to the top-five on lap 131 during a caution flag.
– The No. 00 came to pit road for four tires and fuel during the stop and returned to the racetrack in the fifth position after gaining two spots.
– Custer restarted fifth with less than 60 laps to go before being involved in a wreck with Brandon Jones on lap 133, ending his day.

Next Up: Alsco 300 at Bristol Motor Speedway in Bristol, Tennessee, on April 6th at 1 p.m. EDT broadcast by Fox Sports 1.

Cole Custer, driver of the No. 00 Jacob Companies Ford Mustang:

“I got loose under the 19 car on the restart. You have to push so hard because it’s so difficult to pass here after a couple laps. You just have to get what you can get. I wasn’t having the best restarts all day, so I was trying to be aggressive there and pushed it too hard.”

CHASE BRISCOE – 2019 NXS Texas I Race Report

Race Name: My Bariatric Solutions 300 (Race 6 of 33)
Venue: Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth, Texas
Series: NASCAR Xfinity Series
Race Winner: Kyle Busch of Joe Gibbs Racing (Toyota)
Results: Chase Briscoe: 4th  | Cole Custer: 34th
Point Standings:
– Cole Custer: 3rd with 226 points; trails points leader by 42 points
– Chase Briscoe: 11th with 178 points; trails points leader by 90 points

Chase Briscoe / Nutri Chomps Ford Mustang Recap:
– Briscoe started 15th and finished 16th in Stage 1.
– The Nutri Chomps Ford started Stage 2 in 12th and finished 17th. 
– The No. 98 Ford started 16th in the final stage and ran as high as eighth with 20 laps to go.
– A caution with 12 laps remaining brought the No. 98 Ford to pit road for four tires and fuel.
– Briscoe restarted fifth and raced up to fourth position with six laps remaining.
– The No. 98 Ford battled in the closing laps and finished in the fourth position.
– Briscoe scored his second consecutive top-five finish and fourth consecutive top-10 of the 2019 season. 

Next Up: Alsco 300 at Bristol Motor Speedway in Bristol, Tennessee, on April 6th at 1 p.m. EDT broadcast by Fox Sports 1.

Chase Briscoe, driver of the No. 98 Nutri Chomps Ford Mustang:                                                   

“It’s going to be pretty cool to run for $100,000. it’s not every week you get to do that. I feel like we really should have been in victory lane, if that caution didn’t come out at the end we would have been the only car able to make it on fuel, seems like that always happens to us. I’m just really proud of all of my Nutri Chomps guys, we were a 13th to 16th place car all day. They kept working on it and we were able to establish track position and ended up getting a top-five out of it. We just have to get better throughout the weekend and I have to get better. Once we put it all together we are going to be the team to beat.”

DANIEL SUÁREZ – 2019 Texas I Race Advance

Daniel Suárez and the No. 41 Ruckus Ford Mustang team for Stewart-Haas Racing (SHR) make the journey to Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth this weekend. Texas marks the seventh event this season on the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series circuit. For the second time in 2019, the Mexico native will pilot the Ruckus-themed Mustang.

Ruckus Networks, an ARRIS company, is redefining connectivity by bridging the digital divide and connecting people around the world. Ruckus strives to deliver ubiquitous connectivity to its access points, switches and cloud services.

After qualifying and finishing 10th last weekend at Martinsville (Va.) Speedway, Suárez is 16th in the Cup Series point standings to round out the four-car SHR contingent in the standings. The top 16 drivers after the 26 regular-season races will earn a spot in the NASCAR playoffs.

Texas is the second 1.5-mile track the Cup Series visits this season, the first being Atlanta Motor Speedway last month, when Suárez earned a 10th-place finish in the No. 41 Ford Mustang. In Suárez’s last 10 starts at 1.5-mile tracks, he has an average starting position of 13.6 and an average finishing position of 18.6.

Suárez heads into this weekend looking for his first Cup Series top-10 at Texas. In his four Cup Series starts at the Fort Worth oval, he has a best starting spot of sixth and a best finish of 14th – both earned in November 2017. Additionally, he has five starts in the NASCAR Xfinity Series at Texas with one top-five finish and two top-10s, along with three laps led. In the NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series, he made three starts in 2015 and 2016 with top-five finishes in all three starts, including two runner-up results, along with six laps led.

“I have some work to do in the Cup Series at Texas, and I really liked the track before the repave and ran well there in the Xfinity and Truck Series,” the Ruckus driver said. “It’s going to be totally different this weekend, though, with the new rules package.”

Texas is closest track on the schedule to Suárez’s hometown of Monterrey, Mexico. “I have some friends and a couple of family members coming to the track this weekend,” he said. “The West Coast races and Texas are the closest for my family and friends, and it’s fun to have them come to the track because I don’t get to see them a lot.”

Ruckus, a technology provider, and SHR, a racing organization, both ultimately strive to achieve the same goals – to operate at high performance. Ruckus provides secure and reliable access to applications and services, and offers a complete offering of high-performance network equipment. The company’s portfolio includes Wi-Fi controllers, indoor and outdoor access points, switches, network access security, and support and services.

SHR has three Cup Series wins at Texas, two earned by Suárez’s teammate Kevin Harvick, whose most recent Texas win came last November. SHR co-owner Tony Stewart rounds out the trio of wins.

Ford has captured three victories so far this season, which accounts for 50 percent of the races to this point. The new Cup Series Mustang also has four pole awards, two of those by Suárez’s SHR teammates Aric Almirola and Harvick. At Texas, the Blue Oval has the most wins of all manufacturers in the Cup Series with 14.

 

Daniel Suárez, Driver of the No. 41 Ruckus Ford Mustang for Stewart-Haas Racing:

 

We are a few races into this season. How are things going with you and your team?

“I’m having a lot of fun. I’m still getting to know everyone on my team, but we’ve been making progress. We’ve been fixing the little issues we have here and they are getting better. I feel like we have come a long way so far and we’ll keep getting better.”

What do you expect from Texas this weekend?

“Texas is such a fast mile-and-a-half and this year we have the new package, new engine, a lot of new things. Every team is obviously trying to get better with the new package and this is the second mile-and-a-half this year, so we’ll start to see which teams are really making progress since we’ve all had a few couple of weeks to work on the new package. SHR has really been working hard to make our cars faster and to drive better. Texas will be interesting, that’s for sure.”

Tony Raines is your spotter this season and it’s your first time working with him. How is that going?

“Tony is a new voice for me to hear as my spotter. We’re still getting used to each other and I’m gaining a lot of trust in his voice. He worked with Kurt (Busch) in the past and what Kurt liked and what I like are different, so we’ve been working a lot on what I need him to tell me and those types of things. I like for Tony to tell me a lot of information, like, what the people in front of me are doing that’s working for them so it can help me make decisions on how I think I should be getting around the track.”

CHASE BRISCOE – 2019 NXS Texas I Race Advance

Date: March 30, 2019
Race Name: My Bariatric Solutions 300 (Race 6 of 33)
Venue: Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth, Texas
Television: 1:00 p.m. EDT on FOX Sports 1
Point Standings: 
– Cole Custer: 2nd; trails points leader by 7 points
– Chase Briscoe: 11th; trails points leader by 75 points

CHASE BRISCOE NOTES OF INTEREST:
Crew Chief: Richard Boswell        Spotter: Tim Fedewa

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You have three consecutive top-10 finishes heading into this weekend. What is it that has the team hitting on all cylinders and what do you need to do to keep this streak going?

“I feel like it has taken us a couple weeks to learn each other. (Richard) Boswell and I are visiting a lot of these tracks for the first time. Every week we have continued to get faster during the race and throughout the weekend, so we just have keep doing that and we’ll be right where we need to be.”

COLE CUSTER – 2019 NXS Texas I Race Advance

Date: March 30, 2019
Race Name: My Bariatric Solutions 300 (Race 6 of 33)
Venue: Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth, Texas
Television: 1:00 p.m. EDT on FOX Sports 1
Point Standings: 
– Cole Custer: 2nd; trails points leader by 7 points
– Chase Briscoe: 11th; trails points leader by 75 points

COLE CUSTER NOTES OF INTEREST:

Crew Chief: Mike Shiplett        Spotter: Joel Edmonds


Jacob Companies, Inc. (Jacob), is a multifaceted construction firm with a focus on construction, development, design and technology services. Jacob provides clients with a wide range of services in the Design Build and Construction Management sectors of the construction industry. In conjunction with these services, Jacob self performs structural concrete, architectural and structural precast erection.

You have never finished outside the top-5 at Texas Motor Speedway in the Xfinity Series. What is it about Texas that suits your driving style so well?

“Texas has always been a really good track for us. I’ve always had fast cars here and that’s the biggest piece of the puzzle. They recently repaved the track so it’s difficult to get a hold of from a setup standpoint because the two ends of the track are so different. It’s all about trying to get through turns one and two since they removed some of the banking, but we’ve been able to do that in the past so hopefully we can do it again this weekend.”

ARIC ALMIROLA – 2019 Texas I Race Advance

Last weekend, Aric Almirola, driver of the No. 10 Smithfield Prime Fresh Ford Mustang for Stewart-Haas Racing (SHR), extended his streak of top-10 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series finishes to five, eclipsing his previous best of four top-10s in a row. And, his five consecutive top-10s have come during the opening six races of 2019, giving the 35-year-old Tampa native his best start to a season to date.

With a pole award, a top-five finish and 69 laps led in the first six races of 2019, and his only finish outside the top-10 coming at the season-opening Daytona 500, where he was caught in a multicar accident on lap 191, it’s safe to say Almirola and the No. 10 Ford team is primed for the second event of the season on a 1.5-mile oval Sunday at Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth.

Almirola and his team are also hoping their recent success at tracks like the Texas oval – the bread and butter of the Cup Series schedule – have primed them for this weekend. In his last 10 starts at 1.5 mile tracks, Almirola has eight top-10 finishes and has led 106 laps with an average starting position of 9.0 and an average finish of 10.3.

In addition to his Cup Series experience at Texas, Almirola has four NASCAR Xfinity Series starts, all top-20 finishes, and five laps led. He’s also made nine Gander Outdoors Truck Series starts at Texas with two top-10s and 14 laps led.

As he and the team comes off this year’s West Coast swing consisting of Las Vegas Motor Speedway, ISM Raceway near Phoenix and Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, California, and last weekend’s short-track race at Martinsville (Va.) Speedway, where Almirola qualified second and finished ninth, they are finally able to take what they learned at the 1.5-mile Atlanta Motor Speedway oval during week two of the season in hopes of competing for the win at Texas.

“Texas is finally the first opportunity that we’ll have to actually implement change into our cars,” Almirola said. “Our West Coast cars were essentially built as we were getting ready for Atlanta. All of our cars for the beginning of the season were built with one mindset from the engineering and the aero department. Now we’ve had an opportunity to run those handful of races and go back and digest all of the information and look at everything. We are able to find out where we were beat and work on that area and to implement that into our Texas cars.”

While Almirola recognizes his career-best success over the opening six races this season, his passion for racing and competition tells him there is much more potential to unlock from the multiple championship-winning SHR organization.

“I’ve led more laps in the beginning of this year than I’ve led in any other year in my career,” Almirola said. “I’m off to the best start of my career, yet we feel like our cars are not where they were last year, and that’s one of the things that has me the most pumped up about this season. The aero department, the engineering department, the people down on the shop floor have all been turning some long hours to correct some things that we feel like we’ve been missing and I think some of that will already be implemented into our Texas cars this weekend.”

Texas is the second event during which the Smithfield Prime Fresh livery will adorn Almirola’s No. 10 Ford Mustang. Smithfield, a brand of Smithfield Foods, which is based approximately five hours northeast of SHR headquarters in Smithfield, Virginia, is in its seventh season with Almirola and its first with SHR. Founded in 1936, Smithfield is a leading provider of high-quality pork products, with a vast product portfolio including smoked meats, hams, bacon, sausage, ribs, and a wide variety of fresh pork cuts. Smithfield Prime Fresh Delicatessen offers customers the freshest, highest-quality deli meats without the wait.

Almirola’s most recent run at Texas last November resulted in an eighth-place finish after starting in fourth. His teammate Kevin Harvick took the win that day after finishing second in the spring Texas race, a good indication SHR’s Ford Mustangs should all be prime contenders for Sunday’s O’Reilly Auto Parts 500 victory.

 

Aric Almirola, Driver of the No. 10 Smithfield Prime Fresh Ford Mustang for Stewart-Haas Racing:

 

What have you seen so far from the new rules package?

“I think what we’ve seen so far is very typical of what happens in our sport. There are rule changes and, when we have those rule changes, there are a couple of teams that figure it out faster than anybody else and they clearly separate themselves from the rest. I think we have seen that from (Team) Penske and (Joe) Gibbs (Racing). It’s the same cars contending to win the races week in and week out at every track. When you look back to Atlanta, Vegas, Phoenix and then California, those cars were the most dominant cars. There were some other cars that showed some slight moments of speed and competitiveness but, for the vast majority of the race those weekends, those cars were the ones to beat. But all of the other teams have gone to work. They start looking at where their deficiencies are and start figuring it out and the really good teams catch up, and then we start to get more parity and you even saw that last year. Look back at last year and look at the beginning of the year. Through the first six months of the year, nobody would have picked a Penske car to win the championship.  All the talk was about Gibbs and the 18 and the 78 and about Stewart-Haas Racing and the 4 car, predominantly. But then you look at the latter half of the year and Brad (Keselowski) goes on to win three races in a row, historic, big races – Darlington, Indy, the first race of the playoffs – and then Joey (Logano) wins at Martinsville and wins the championship. So, tides turn, things change, really good race teams go to work and develop and figure out what they need to go fast, and so I feel like for us at Stewart-Haas Racing, we’re in that stage right now.”

What is the most difficult thing to get right or figure out at Texas Motor Speedway?

“I think the most difficult thing at Texas is that it’s repaved and they changed the banking in turns one and two, and it’s just the speed you carry through the banked corner of turns three and four, and then you have to get slowed down for the flat turns one and two. That has made it very challenging. Then, the exit of turn two is very flat, so you’re carrying some speed there and the car just doesn’t have a lot of grip because there isn’t any banking.”

KEVIN HARVICK – 2019 Texas I Race Advance

On the Sept. 26, 1992 episode of Saturday Night Live, one “memorable” skit starred Nicolas Cage, Kevin Nealon, Rob Schneider and Chris Farley.

Nicolas Cage was playing “Tiny Elvis,” who was about 5 inches tall and couldn’t believe how big the lamp was in the living room or how big the salt shaker was. The skit hasn’t been played much in highlight shows in the past 27 years and has sort of been forgotten.

“Tiny Kevin Harvick” is a little more memorable. Two years ago, Mobil 1 produced a commercial featuring “Tiny Kevin,” which encouraged drivers to use Mobil 1 technology in their cars.

Well, after two years of Tiny Kevin, a tag team has now been formed.

Tiny Kevin Harvick is back and he wants to make sure drivers choose the right motor oil to protect their engines. See why Mobil 1™ synthetic motor oil outperforms conventional motor oil at http://mobiloil.com/en/article/why-the-mobil-advantage/mobil-1-performance/synthetic-versus-conventional?WT.mc_id=YT_250k_miles_Spokesman&WT.tsrc=social

This year, Kevin will be joined by teammate Clint Bowyer in the “Paid Spokesperson” role. The new commercial began airing March 25.

And there is no better place for Tiny Kevin to become Big Kevin than this week at Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth.

Harvick, driver of the No. 4 Mobil 1/O’Reilly Auto Parts Ford Mustang for Stewart-Haas Racing, has been bigger and better than any other driver in his last nine races at the 1.5-mile oval.

He has two wins, three seconds, one third- and one fourth-place finish, and he’s finished in the top-10 in all nine races. He’s won one pole and led laps in all but one of those last nine races for a total of 489 laps.

Harvick has also won five NASCAR Xfinty Series races at Texas and has led 779 laps while also winning two poles.And in the NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series,he has raced at Texas four times with a win in 2011. Harvick won’t race in either series this weekend but will be the lead driver analyst for FS1 during its broadcast of the Xfinity race.

The No. 4 Mobil 1/O’Reilly Auto Parts Ford Mustang would look good in victory lane this week at Texas. And maybe they can find a small cowboy hat for “Tiny Kevin.”

 

KEVIN HARVICK, Driver of the No. 4 Mobil 1/O’Reilly Auto Parts Ford Mustang for Stewart-Haas Racing: 

 

Veteran drivers have won every race this year. How valuable is experience?

“I think in the last month or so you have seen the veteran guys shine. I used to tell Danica Patrick this all the time – ‘I have 25 years on you and you will never catch up.’ And that is the truth. Experience matters, more so in our sport than maybe any other sport. The knowledge of the racetrack, things you have been through, things you have done. There will be some guys – let’s use Carl Edwards as an example. He went through the Xfinity Series and caught on really fast, caught on in Cup really fast and it all just happened for him. There is so much change this year. You have to lean on that past experience. For us, I feel like that is why we have had decent finishes the first few weeks. I don’t think as a group we feel like our cars are where they need to be, but that experience has led to decent finishes so we can change the things we want to when we get home.”

You’ve had different aero packages early in the season. Talk about that.  

“I think we are seeing some of the unintended consequences of this package because it is a lot of work. 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 four or five 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. You 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.”