Following a productive doubleheader weekend at Pocono Raceway, Kevin Harvick is set to achieve a milestone of his own on Sunday, July 5, at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. By taking the green flag in the Big Machine Hand Sanitizer 400 at Indianapolis, Harvick will break a tie with two-time champion and NASCAR Hall of Famer Terry Labonte and move into sixth place on the all-time NASCAR Cup consecutive starts list with 656 series consecutive starts.
The consecutive streak for Harvick dates all the way back to Talladega Superspeedway in April 2002, a week after Harvick served a one-race suspension in the Cup race after being penalized by NASCAR the day before for rough driving in the Truck Series at Martinsville, where he intentionally spun out Coy Gibbs. In his previous 655 consecutive race span dating through June 28, 2020, Harvick has tallied 50 Cup wins, 31 poles, 207 top-five finishes and 356 top-10 finishes while leading over 14,000 laps and competing for two organizations, Richard Childress Racing and Stewart-Haas Racing. During this span, Harvick won three Clash events at Daytona International Speedway, two All-Star races and his first Cup championship in 2014 with SHR. He has finished in the top 10 in the final standings 15 times and has made the Championship Round in five of the last six seasons.
After finishing second last weekend in the second Pocono Raceway event of the weekend, Harvick tied Labonte for sixth on the all-time Cup consecutive starts list. In addition to breaking the tie and moving into sole possession of the sixth-place position in the consecutive starts list, Harvick will make his 20th consecutive/career start at the famed Indianapolis Motor Speedway, a track where he has recorded 13 top-10 finishes and two victories, (2003 and 2019). Currently, Harvick holds the best stats among active Cup competitors at Indianapolis in five categories, which includes 13 top-10 results, three poles, over 3,000 laps led, 18 lead-lap finishes and an average result of 8.95.
Harvick is currently in his seventh season driving the No. 4 Ford Mustang for Stewart-Haas Racing with crew chief Rodney Childers atop the pit box. Through 15 races of the 2020 season, Harvick has won three races, including one of the two doubleheader races at Pocono Raceway last weekend, and has recorded one stage win and 12 top-10 results as he leads the regular-season series standings by 52 points over Ryan Blaney. The 2014 Cup champion is set to become the leading active Cup competitor with consecutive starts once seven-time Cup champion Jimmie Johnson retires from full-time racing at this season’s conclusion. Harvick is also three races away from becoming the 17th competitor to achieve 700 starts in NASCAR’s premier series as he pursues his quest to win his second series championship.
Catch Harvick’s milestone start and his attempt to defend his Indianapolis title in the Big Machine Hand Sanitizer 400 on July 5 at 4 p.m. ET on NBC.
