NASCAR will not penalize Kevin Harvick for his actions during the final laps of Sunday’s race at Talladega Superspeedway.
NASCAR clears Kevin Harvick of any wrongdoing at Talladega
Kevin Harvick will face no sanctions for triggering a controversial crash at the end of Sunday’s race.
Officials reviewed video, team radio transmissions and downloadable data from Harvick’s No. 4 car to determine whether the defending Sprint Cup champion attempted to manipulate the finish order by crashing Trevor Bayne to ensure the CampingWorld.com 500 ended under the caution flag.
With no evidence demonstrating Harvick acted nefariously, NASCAR confirmed Sunday’s race results are official Tuesday. Harvick maintains his 15th-place finish, which advances him to the third round of the Chase for the Sprint Cup playoff by a six-point margin over Ryan Newman, the first driver not to qualify.
Mechanical troubles slowed Harvick over the closing laps and on a green-white-checkered restart he veered into Trevor Bayne who spun and caused a multi-car accident, ending the race due to the resulting caution. Had there been no yellow flag, Harvick would have likely fell down the running order and lost enough positions and not transferred out of the second playoff round.
Harvick said post-race he did not see Bayne to his outside and because of his slowing car was only trying to move up the track to get out of the field’s way. But Bayne, Denny Hamlin, Matt Kenseth, Ryan Newman and David Gilliland disputed Harvick’s assertion, believing he intentionally wrecked Bayne to get the caution that would allow him to finish high enough to advance in the Chase. Kenseth and Hamlin were among those caught up in the chain reaction incident and eliminated from the playoffs.
“(Harvick) knew he was blowing up, so he said he was going to stay in his lane,” Kenseth said. “(Bayne) then went up and outside and he clipped him and caused a wreck because he knew he’d make the Chase that way.”
After reviewing the finish immediately afterward Sunday and meeting with car owner Joe Gibbs, Kenseth and Hamlin’s team owner, and Ryan Newman’s crew chief Luke Lambert, NASCAR vice chairman Mike Helton said there was no evidence Harvick did anything deliberately.
Helton did indicate, though, that the sanctioning body would continue to investigate further before declaring the race official and setting the eight-driver Round 3 playoff field. But Tuesday’s announcement effectively closes the investigation.
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