Kevin Harvick weighs in on Kyle Larson, Ryan Blaney controversial final restart

Kevin Harvick weighed in on the controversial restart where Kyle Larson took the lead from Ryan Blaney, after Brad Keselowski ran out of gas, gifting the No. 5 the prime restart position on the inside.

Blaney wasn’t happy with the way it all shook out, but Harvick didn’t have a problem with how Larson’s key pass for the win transpired, as he explained on the latest episode of Harvick’s Happy Hour.

“Brad must’ve saved a ton of gas, at some point, when he was in the middle of that pack, at the beginning of that run, and how all of that shook out. This is a very unique situation, and I think that we said it earlier, Kyle Larson had a lot of things fall his way, in order to win the race,” Harvick started. “This restart situation, with Brad pulling off the race track, and Kyle, assuming the front row on the inside, on the restart, I’m not sure that — well, I know I’m sure that I know that Kyle Larson didn’t know whether he was in control or not. We heard Tyler Reddick talk about it after the race, not knowing the exact scenario of who was the controller of the restart, at that particular point.

“[Ryan] Blaney was the control car. The restart was tight. I went back and watched it a couple of times, I don’t see anything that I would call a penalty, on Larson jumping the start. I think he just, they took off about the same time, and he just beat Blaney through the gears, it looked like to me. So, a very unique scenario, that wound up ultimately being the thing that won him the race.”

Additionally, Harvick stated that Larson picking the inside behind Keselowski was a strategy call in itself, and one that rewarded his team in grand fashion.

“When we did our Victory Lane interview, you heard Kyle Larson reference, ‘We wanted to pick behind Brad, because we thought he might run out of gas on the pace laps coming to the green,’ so there’s this constant thought process of things that are going on, and that was definitely a part of the conversation, of Larson and those guys picking behind Brad, thinking that they might run out of gas,” Harvick added. “Blaney obviously felt like he was in a good position, because he felt like Brad might not go on the restart.

“But Ryan flipped out. He was angry. … But you know, you get into this scenario, if you say, ‘Okay, NASCAR should throw the caution,’ well now we have a feel mileage race, and now we’re going to go two more laps, with a caution? There’s just some of these things that just happen, and it’s just the luck of the racing gods, and Kyle Larson got that moment, where he was granted a gift, because they were coming to the green.”

Alas, Kyle Larson joined Kevin Harvick as a fellow Brickyard 400 winner, but it’s easy to see why Ryan Blaney was frustrated with the way it all transpired. The reigning NASCAR Cup Series champion will have some extra time to reflect on it, as the campaign won’t resume until Aug. 11.