This Week
Race: Bojangles’ Southern 500
Track: Darlington Raceway
TV: FOX, 6 p.m. ET
Radio: MRN Radio affiliates, Sirius XM NASCAR Radio
Track Facts
Track Length: 1.366 miles
Race Length: 367 laps/501.3 miles
Grandstand Seating Capacity: 60,000
First Race: September 4, 1950
Banking in Turns 1 and 2: 25 degrees
Banking in Turns 3 and 4: 23 degrees
Banking on the Straights: 6 degrees
Frontstretch: 1,229 feet
Backstretch: 1,229 feet
Rearview Mirror
During Monday’s rain-delayed race at Texas Motor Speedway, Harvick started 3rd and finished 42nd due to an engine failure early in the event.
Budweiser Racing Team Notes of Interest
Kevin Harvick and the No. 4 Budweiser Chevrolet SS team travel to Darlington (S.C.) Raceway this weekend for the Bojangles’ Southern 500 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series (NSCS) race.
Chassis Info…The No. 4 Budweiser Racing team will utilize Chassis No. 843 in Saturday night’s race. Harvick last raced this car at Las Vegas Motor Speedway in March. In that event, Harvick led 23 laps before an issue with the left-front hub sent the team to the garage area for repairs, which relegated them to a 41st-place finish.
Darlington Stats… Harvick has 17 prior NSCS starts at Darlington. He has earned three top fives and six top 10s, and has an average start of 17.2 and an average finish of 17.9.
Budweiser #SpeedTweets… Budweiser is tapping into race fans increasing affinity for social media by using Twitter to engage in a new and unprecedented way. The brewer’s latest effort, #SpeedTweets, is a Twitter-based weekly competition that will award 19 fans a trip to Charlotte, N.C., to go-kart race with Harvick in an epic go-kart event. The contest runs the first 19 weeks of the 2014 NSCS schedule, with Budweiser’s official racing Twitter account, @BudweiserRacing, posting challenges throughout each race weekend. Participants (21 and older only) are required to register at Budweiser.com/SpeedTweets must follow @BudweiserRacing, and must reply to @BudweiserRacing with the hashtag #SpeedTweets in order for their answers to be considered. For information on contest rules and regulations, please visit .
A Look Back… During last year’s Bojangles’ Southern 500, Harvick started 10th and finished fifth.
Loop Data… Harvick owns a number of solid marks in NASCAR’s Loop Data scoring system at Darlington heading into this weekend’s event including: seventh in closers (9 positions gained); ninth in green flag passes (457 passes); 10th in laps in top 15 (2,157 laps); and 10th in quality passes (244 passes).
Harvick on Racing at Darlington Raceway
Talk us through a lap around Darlington. “Well, any lap around Darlington is a lap where you have got to be paying attention to what’s going on because you can get yourself in trouble at any point on the race track. You carry a lot of speed into Turn 1 and you run right up the banking right up next to the wall and right back into the throttle. As you come back down the hill you might have to breathe the throttle a little bit, but it’s a lot of fun coming out of Turn 2 as it kind of shoots you down the backstretch. Turns 3 and 4 are probably the hardest because you carry so much speed off of (Turn) 2 into (Turn) 3 and the line kind of moves around a bit there. It’s probably the easiest place to get in the wall. Well it’s pretty easy to get in the wall anywhere, but definitely the easiest place to get into the wall is the middle of (Turns) 3 and 4.”
What makes racing at Darlington Raceway such a challenge for the drivers and teams? “The track was originally not designed for the cars to be running as fast as they are now. The track’s very narrow and you carry a lot of speed. From a driver’s standpoint, it’s very challenging just to keep the car off the wall, but it’s also a lot of fun to drive, too.”
Talk about the history of racing at Darlington Raceway. “There is a lot of history at Darlington (Raceway). I’ve been fortunate to win a lot of the marquee races on the schedule and I mark the Southern 500 on my calendar every year as one I want to win. There is so much history behind this event. It’s definitely a race we want to do well in.”
