After a three-year-long absence from the hallowed oval of Indianapolis Motor Speedway, NASCAR returned. But the homecoming involved several caveats, ranging from Kyle Larson giving Ryan Blaney the slip and soaring to victory to the last-lap caution call. Countering Blaney’s backlash against NASCAR favoring Larson, Kevin Harvick believed the latter’s win was legitimate.

However, the retired Cup veteran held NASCAR to task for the controversial caution call. As Indianapolis is a track that holds fond memories for Kevin Harvick, the problems caught his eye fast. Harvick pointed out the delay in waving the yellow flag that allowed the race results to get shuffled and drew several irked eyes at the sport’s judicial wing.

Kevin Harvick sees a fault in the last-lap call

The 2014 NASCAR Cup champion hung up his firesuit last year. But Kevin Harvick’s racetrack memories live on, and Indianapolis Motor Speedway is quite a special track for him. Harvick conquered the crown jewel trophy of the Brickyard 400 right when he was starting, in 2003. He followed that up with two consecutive wins in 2019 and 2020. Hence the comeback to his favorite track was special for Harvick, and NASCAR’s last-lap muck-up stung him more.

With two laps to go on the second overtime restart, Ryan Preece got hit by Chase Elliott. Then he bizarrely sputtered to a stop mid-track. But NASCAR took a considerably long amount of time to deliberate on that. In Kevin Harvick’s Happy Hour podcast’s post on X, Harvick reflected on this incident. “When Preece spun out, he was mid-pack. He wound up nosing into the fence barely and the tire was flat. He was on the rub blocks, the tire was flat, he was not going anywhere. And they waited and waited and waited and he wasn’t moving sitting up on the racetrack.” 

The late caution called at the Toyota Owners 400 allowed Denny Hamlin to shatter Martin Truex Jr.’s dominance. Reflecting on the same, Kevin Harvick highlighted this inconsistency in judgment on the part of NASCAR, saying “The caution should have been thrown in Turn 4. And it just doesn’t seem there’s as much consistency as there needs to be when it comes to these calls at the end of the race. Whether you throw a caution or not throw a caution.”

Kevin Harvick further observed that Ryan Preece’s debacle was visible in broad daylight, and NASCAR lapsed in its call. He said, “Whoever was watching that needs to be talked to. Because the left-rear tire was down… it was sitting on the rub blocks. And when they sit on the rub blocks, they don’t move. I just believe that was a missed call. A badly missed call.”

The 2024 NASCAR race in Indianapolis got on the nerves of the three-time Brickyard winner. However, Kevin Harvick had a fond memory to look back upon to soothe himself.

The first time felt awesome

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The IMS road course has been a highly revered motorsport track for over a century. So when NASCAR finally secured its race at the Racing Capital of the World in 1994, the results were phenomenal. Racing heavyweights like Jeff Gordon, Dale Earnhardt, and Dale Jarrett have won the initial races, drawing 200,000 fans to the crown jewel event. Kevin Harvick also shot to victory at this respected track in 2003, holding off Matt Kenseth, Jamie McMurray, and Jeff Gordon on his way to the win.

Harvick’s Victory Lane emotions soared, and his team owner, Richard Childress, added icing to the cake. Recently, he reflected on the most rewarding moment of his first Brickyard 400 win. “The coolest part about winning that first Brickyard in ’03, at that point, there were 300,000 people around the racetrack, and they treated it like the Indy 500. So, you would ride in the back of the pace car, or one of the show cars, with your — I rode with DeLana myself, crew chief and owner. So, it was myself, my wife and Richard [Childress] and crew chief. We rode around, and all the Indy fans, they’re trained in this tradition, they hadn’t left.”

Evidently, Kevin Harvick has a lot to recollect when dwelling upon the Brickyard 400 race. Yet NASCAR may not pay heed to his complaints about the last-lap call, as executives have firmly justified it already.