Stewart-Haas Racing: Dover 400 from Delaware

Race Winner:  Chase Elliott of Hendrick Motorsports (Chevrolet)

Stage 1 Winner:  Denny Hamlin of Joe Gibbs Racing (Toyota)

Stage 2 Winner:  Ryan Blaney of Team Penske (Ford)

 

SHR Race Finish:            

●  Kevin Harvick (Started 11th, Finished 9th / Running, completed 400 of 400 laps)

●  Chase Briscoe (Started 23rd, Finished 13th / Running, completed 400 of 400 laps)  

●  Cole Custer (Started 30th, Finished 15th / Running, completed 400 of 400 laps)

●  Aric Almirola (Started 27th, Finished 19th / Running, completed 399 of 400 laps)

 

SHR Points:

●  Aric Almirola (11th with 283 points, 135 out of first)

●  Kevin Harvick (12th with 280 points, 138 out of first)

●  Chase Briscoe (13th with 270 points, 148 out of first)

●  Cole Custer (25th with 189 points, 229 out of first)

 

SHR Notes:        

●  Harvick earned his fifth top-10 of the season and his 23rd top-10 in 42 career NASCAR Cup Series starts at Dover.

●  Harvick’s 23 top-10s at Dover are the most among active NASCAR Cup Series drivers. Kyle Busch is next best with 21 top-10s.

●  This was Harvick’s eighth straight top-10 at Dover, a run kicked off by a win in May 2018 and punctuated by another victory on Aug. 23, 2020.

●  This was Harvick’s second straight top-10. He finished 10th in the series’ prior race at Talladega (Ala.) Superspeedway.

●  Briscoe’s 13th-place result was his best in two career NASCAR Cup Series starts at Dover.

●  Custer earned his third top-15 of the season and his fourth top-15 in four career NASCAR Cup Series starts at Dover.

●  Since joining SHR in 2018, Almirola has only one finish outside the top-20 at Dover.

 

Race Notes:       

●  Chase Elliott won the Dover 400 to score his 14th career NASCAR Cup Series victory, his first of the season and his second at Dover. He beat Ricky Stenhouse Jr., as the race finished under caution.

●  There were 13 caution periods for a total of 75 laps.

●  Only 15 of the 36 drivers in the race finished on the lead lap.

●  Elliott remains the championship leader after Dover with a 50-point advantage over second-place Ryan Blaney.

 

Sound Bites:

 

“We just lost the car right there at the end of the second stage and it was plowing tight. We never really were able to find anything to make it any better. I’m not sure what happened. We’ll try to figure that out and go back to work for Darlington next weekend.” – Kevin Harvick, driver of the No. 4 Hunt Brothers Pizza Ford Mustang

 

“We were just fighting all day trying to make the car better. We got it decent by halfway through and we worked the pit strategy right and caught some luck and got a solid finish. The guys fought hard all day. They did a good job keeping us in the mix and we ended up making something of it.” – Cole Custer, driver of the No. 41 Autodesk/HaasTooling.com Ford Mustang

 

“We were so behind after practice, we just didn’t get a lot of time to work on it with so many cautions, but we made it better for qualifying. We were still pretty far off Sunday when the race started, and warmer weather today really didn’t help. Johnny (Klausmeier, crew chief) and the guys did a great job working on it and, by the end, our balance was good. We just didn’t have enough time to make up ground, and dirty air was a major factor.” – Chase Briscoe, driver of the No. 14 Mahindra Tractors Ford Mustang

 

“Man, we had a car capable of running top-10 all day. We didn’t have it in practice or qualifying on Saturday, and Drew (Blickensderfer, crew chief) and the guys made the right changes for the race. Unfortunately, we just got caught on pit road at the wrong time and it put us two laps down. We were still racing hard and kept our Smithfield/Weis Ford in the ‘Lucky Dog’ position, but we didn’t get the break we needed to race for position again. All in all, we had a good car and good speed, so I’m proud of that.” – Aric Almirola, driver of the No. 10 Smithfield/Weis Mustang

 

Next Up:

The next event on the NASCAR Cup Series schedule is the Goodyear 400 on May 8 at Darlington (S.C.) Raceway. The race begins at 3:30 p.m. EDT with live coverage provided by FS1 and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.

 

SHR PR