Notes of Interest
* After celebrating last Sunday’s win with a “Budweiser bath” in Victory Lane at Auto Club Speedway, Kevin Harvick and the No. 29 Budweiser Chevrolet team will race a bit closer to home in this weekend’s Goody’s Fast Pain Relief 500 at Martinsville (Va.) Speedway.
* The No. 29 Budweiser Chevrolet team hauler drivers Mark Williams and Barry Sheppard both call Martinsville, Va., area home. While they drove approximately 2,408 miles one way from the Richard Childress Racing shop in Welcome, N.C., to Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, Calif., for last weekend’s Auto Club 400, this week they’ll drive just over 125 miles round trip for the race at Martinsville Speedway.
* Harvick will race chassis No. 332 from the Richard Childress Racing NASCAR Sprint Cup Series stable this weekend at Martinsville. Earlier this year he drove this Chevrolet to a fourth-place finish at Phoenix International Raceway.
· In 19 starts at Martinsville Speedway, Harvick has earned one top five and eight top-10 finishes. He’s completed 97.2 percent (9,250 of 9,519) total laps and has led a total of 301 laps at the Martinsville, Va., track. Harvick has an average starting position of 14.6 and an average finishing position of 17.3 at the 0.526-mile track.
· Harvick and RCR’s No. 29 team had a solid start in last spring’s race at Martinsville Speedway. Harvick started the race from the pole position and led 57 laps before mechanical problems sent him to the garage for repairs. He finished the race 100 laps down in 35th position. When the No. 29 team visited the short track in October, Harvick led 97 laps and took home a third-place finish.
· Harvick’s last-lap pass for the win in Sunday’s Auto Club 400 earned the Bakersfield, Calif., native his first NASCAR Sprint Cup Series win in his home state, and moved him up six spots in the driver point standings to ninth position leading into Sunday’s race at Martinsville. Five races into the 2011 season, Harvick has earned one win, two top fives and three top-10 finishes.
· Harvick will be available to members of the media in the Martinsville Speedway infield media center on Friday, April 1, at 10:15 a.m.
· In addition to his driving duties with the No. 29 Budweiser Chevrolet team, Harvick will drive the No. 2 Tide/Kroger Chevrolet Silverado for Kevin Harvick Inc. (KHI) in Saturday’s NASCAR Camping World Truck Series race. Harvick has ended the past two spring Truck Series races at the short track in Victory Lane in the No. 2 Chevrolet for KHI. Saturday’s Kroger 250 will air live on SPEED at 2 p.m. EDT. MRN Radio and SIRIUS NASCAR Radio will provide the live radio coverage of the event.
· This week in Budweiser Racing history: On April 29, 1990, Geoff Bodine won the Hanes Activewear 500 at Martinsville Speedway in the No. 11 Budweiser ride for team owner Junior Johnson. Bodine started the race from the pole position, led 270 laps and had a 4.5-second lead when he took the checkered flag. The win was the first of three trips to Victory Lane that year for Bodine and the Budweiser Racing team.
