FORT WORTH, TX – November 4, 2019 – Kevin Harvick led the Ford Mustangs to a 1-2-3-4 finish at Texas Motor Speedway. Winning his third straight AAA Texas 500, Harvick advances to the Championship 4 at Homestead-Miami for the fifth time in the past six years.
“Congratulations to Kevin, Tony, Gene, and everyone at Stewart-Haas Racing,” said Doug Yates, President and CEO of Roush Yates Engines. “It was an incredible race, and everyone is pushing so hard to win these last couple of races. It was great to see these Ford Mustangs run so strong. We knew it was going to be a challenge with the changing track temperatures throughout the race, but Rodney and Kevin were well prepared. We {Roush Yates Engines} are proud to be part of the Ford family and look forward to Ford Performance racing for another championship.”
Harvick started the weekend off strong by taking the pole with a qualifying lap of 28.465 mph.
The Ford teams led a combined 247 laps out of the 334-lap race with a race high by Harvick of 119. In addition, Stewart-Haas teammate and Stage 2 winner Aric Almirola led 62 laps while Clint Bowyer had 36 laps and Daniel Suárez led 25 laps.
After leading the field and winning the first Stage, Harvick had to serve a pit-row penalty that put him in the rear of the field, but during a late caution he was able to get new tires on the No. 4 Ford Mustang and take control of the race, passing Almirola for the lead and finishing 1.594 seconds ahead of his SHR teammate. This marked Harvick’s 49th all-time Cup win, tying him with Stewart-Haas co-owner Tony Stewart for 14th on the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series all-time wins list.
“Just really proud of everybody on this team,” noted Harvick in Victory Lane. “Just got to thank everybody from Busch Beer, from Hunt Brothers Pizza, Mobil 1, Jimmy John’s, everybody from Haas Automation and Stewart‑Haas Racing, Roush Yates Engines for the last‑minute engine change and the things that they worked on to give us all the speed we had here, and it was definitely fun to drive.”
Harvick and teammates Almirola and Suárez finished 1-2-3 with Team Penske’s Joey Logano finishing P4 and Ryan Blaney P8.
Harvick is now locked into the Championship 4 Playoffs with reigning 2018 NASCAR Champion, Logano P4 (+20 above the transfer line) and Blaney (-23 below the last transfer spot).
Ford NASCAR Xfinity driver Austin Cindric led the Ford Mustangs with a P4 finish Saturday night at Texas Motor Speedway followed by Cole Custer P8, and Chase Briscoe P22.
In the NXS Playoff driver’s points standings, Custer is P2 (+52) above the transfer line while currently below the last transfer position are Briscoe (-18) and Cindric (-31).
NASCAR heads into the final event of the season this weekend in Arizona before the Homestead-Miami Championship race decides the titles for 2019.
