Kevin Harvick’s win Sunday at New Hampshire was his least Kevin Harvick victory in a long time.
Harvick now has six victories since he claimed his Sprint Cup title in 2014.
Heading into Sunday’s race at New Hampshire, Harvick had led an average of 197.6 laps in his previous five wins with a total of 988 laps.
Then Harvick went and won the Bad Boy Off Road 300 with a grand total of eight laps led.
It was his least dominating win since 2013, when he only led three of the final 10 laps in the spring Richmond race. But it came in a race where Harvick started 19th. It was the 13th time Harvick has started worse than 15th this season, but all three of his wins came in those races.
“These guys were all ‑‑ they were mad after qualifying,” Harvick said. “I was kind of laughing, and it was like, it’s going to be fine. I don’t know if you guys have noticed but we passed a lot of cars over the last three years. We can pass.”
Of his last 15 wins beginning with that 2013 Richmond win, only five have involved Harvick leading less than 100 laps.
To add to it, Harvick’s Loudon win came in a situation the No. 4 team hasn’t experienced in almost two years.
Harvick’s pass for the win came on the last restart on Lap 295. It was the first time Harvick made his last pass for the lead with 10 or less laps to go since he did it at Homestead-Miami Speedway and won the title in 2014.
“It’s nice to be on the side of not leading all the laps and be able to capitalize on a late‑race caution and come out with a win where you didn’t dominate all day and didn’t lead a bunch of laps,” Harvick said. “We were able to capitalize on that today, and that’s making up for one of those that we lost the other way. You’re going to win some, you’re going to lose some, and that’s the fortunate part about our sport; when you have a lot of experience and been around for a long time, you know how that cycle works.”
It was the 15th time in his Sprint Cup career that Harvick has won after making a pass with less than 10 laps to go. That ties him with Richard Petty and David Pearson. Jeff Gordon, a four-time Cup champion, leads with 27, one more than Jimmie Johnson.
Harvick and Johnson are the only active drivers in the top 10 of that list.
