Kevin Harvick is just plainly bad company!
“Freaky Fast” Harvick thoroughly dominated the Consumers Energy 400 at Michigan International Speedway on Sunday for his seventh victory of the 2018 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series season. The victory is his second career win at Michigan and 44th of his premier series career.
Harvick was the runner-up in the spring at Michigan, getting snookered by rain and Stewart-Haas Racing teammate Clint Bowyer’s strategy. Harvick also notched his 11th and 12th stage wins of the season to take all the playoff points from the race. Harvick led 108 of the 200 laps on the day.
Michigan native Brad Keselowski finished second, while Kyle Busch took third place for the second straight week.
Austin Dillon came home in fourth — the No. 3 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet’s best finish since winning the season-opening Daytona 500. The No. 12 piloted by Ryan Blaney completed the top five.
For the second straight race, trouble came early for some top contenders. Joey Logano pitted on a pace lap to replace the left front shock after a crew miscommunication. Martin Truex Jr. and William Byron were involved in a Lap 15 incident off of Turn 2 after contact between the two. Truex Jr. rebounded and held the lead in Stage 2 but gave up the lead with 11 laps to go in Stage 2 and ran out of fuel on the final lap. His trouble increased as he pitted with pit road closed and suffered an uncontrolled tire, as well, on the stop. That effectively took him out of contention for the win. The 2017 champion finished in 14th.
The Fraternal Order of The Go Fast
It seems that Jim, aka Chiefy, saved his choice of Kevin Harvick for the right time, Michigan! Ol Chiefy racked the maximum points of 60 big ones, the most of any player this week. “Happy Harvick” was extremely dominate and swept the stages and led 108 laps of the 200 lap race!
The Movers and Shakers
Also having a very good race weekend at Michigan was Bernie The Bay Area Bandit. The Bay Area Bandit racked up a nifty 52 points from Kyle Busch’s third-place finish.
A very unlikely trio of players fared very nicely at Michigan adding 45 points to their 3rd segment totals. That threesome includes Karen The Highly Opinionated Southern Bell, Carlton The Doorman, as well as Amber The Cheddar Head, all three needed, and received, a good showing this week from Kurt Busch.
Meanwhile, Carole, aka Rudy, had selected the 2018 Daytona 500 winner, Austin Dillon, which paid off handsomely for her with a much needed 39 points.
Rounding out the top five scorers is Linda R. The Lemonade Lefty. The Lemonade Lefty was the only player to choose “The Delivernator”, Denny Hamlin. Even though Hamlin won the pole, early in the race he fell back off of the pace and toiled in obscurity until the closing laps of the race, whereby he motored up to 8th place and rewarded her with 34 points.
Once again the standings look like it was poured into a blender, pushed the pulse button, and then poured out. There were only two players who remained in the previous position, our leader Lonna The Quilt Angel, as well as Bobby Blue Crush, the remaining twenty players changed places.
The biggest movers of the week are Jim, aka Chiefy and Bernie The Bay Area Bandit, shooting up the leaderboard like a bottle rocket, climbing up nine (9) places landing in 7th and 10th places, respectively.
Edie The Las Vegas Super Star and Kathy The Church Forecloser took the opposite approach. Both of these players plummeted down five (5) spots to crash into the 15th and 18th places, respectively.
Meanwhile, Jerry The Buschwacker, Karen The Highly Opinionated Southern Belle, and Doug The Gandy Candy Man all moved four (4) places. The Buschwacker and The Candy Man stumbled and fell down four places on the scoring pylon to rest in 11th and 16th places, respectively. Conversely, The Highly Opinionated One stepped up four places to land in 14th place.
Falling three (3) spots this week is David The Mudslinging Throttle Jockey, now holding down the 17th place.
Rounding out the top five movers this week is a group of six players that includes Carlton The Doorman, Amber The Cheddar Head, Dan The Numbers Cruncher, Linda R. The Lemonade Lefty, Carole, aka Rudy, as well as Linda B. The Cookie Mom. The Doorman, The Cheddar Head, Rudy, and the Cookie Mom all moved up two places to rest in 2nd, 3rd, 13th, and 18th, respectively. Whereas, The Numbers Dude and The Lemonade Lefty fell down two spots to sit in 4th and 5th, respectively.
Straight From The Crapper
This week we have two players sharing “The Crappiest Pick of The Week” award. Both Zee, aka Sissy, and Ol Skid-Marc were riding shotgun with William Byron this week and were only able to scrounge up one (1) microscopic point at Michigan!
That one point that Ol Skidz scored this week was more than enough to evict A&M Aggie Sue out of The Outhouse and control!
Next week NASCAR returns to The Last Great Colosseum, Bristol Motor Speedway.
TIL NEXT TIME, I AM STILL WORKING ON MY REDNECK!