Rain washes out Cup qualifying, Harvick gets pole

With track officials reconfiguring and repaving the 1.5-mile track earlier this season, NASCAR felt is was in the series best interest to opt for practice over time trials. 

“I’m not 100 percent sure that we will still get back out on the track the way the storms keep popping up,” Harvick said. “You hope that you can get out there. I think if we can get that hour of practice at that particular time that is going to be the most realistic thing that we have had or have going forward just because of the time and the conditions and things that we will be dealing with tomorrow night.  

“That will be very beneficial if we can get out there and very important I think for everybody to try to understand exactly what we are dealing with.”

Harvick has never led a lap at Kentucky Speedway but has posted three top-10 finishes in as many Cup starts. Harvick did win two Xfinity Series races but acknowledge with the lack of practice time so far, the racing remains “a little bit of an unknown” between the new surface and the new left-side tire Goodyear opted to bring this weekend.

“We spent two days here testing and obviously we had to make some adjustments – Goodyear had to make some adjustments to the tires coming back to make them live,” Harvick said. “I think as we have gone through practice we haven’t had any tire issues so far. But it changed a lot with the feel of the car and the things that you want in the car.  

“We’ve scrambled a little bit.  I felt like we were better the second time out on the race track.  I think hopefully being able to get some more practice will be beneficial because we still  don’t really have a good idea of exactly where we need to be as far as balance and what is going to happen the longer you run the car.”

Harvick will share the front row with Brad Keselowski, who moved into second in the standings after last Saturday’s win at Daytona International Speedway. Before Kentucky Speedway was repaved, Keselowski enjoyed the fourth best average finish here — 9.6 — bolstered by two Cup wins. Kurt Busch rolls off third followed by Joey Logano, Carl Edwards and Kyle Busch. 

Comprising rows 4 through 6 are Martin Truex Jr., Chase Elliott, Jimmie Johnson, Denny Hamlin, Matt Kenseth and Austin Dillon.