Kevin Harvick: 4Ever A Champion
by Tom Jensen January 22, 2024
As a driver, a car owner and a father, Kevin Harvick has made a career of being a champion.
This year, Kevin Harvick is moving from the seat of the No. 4 Stewart-Haas Racing Ford Mustang to a seat in the FOX Sports NASCAR broadcast booth, where he will share his decades of racing knowledge with millions of television viewers.
During his driving career, Harvick won 60 Cup races, which ranks 10th all-time. Most notably, he earned the 2014 Cup Series championship in his first year driving for Stewart-Haas. Among his most significant Cup race victories, Harvick won the 2007 Daytona 500, as well as three Brickyard 400s and two each of the Southern 500, Coca-Cola 600 and NASCAR All-Star Race.
Harvick’s success and influence stretched far beyond the Cup Series. He won a pair of championships in what is now the NASCAR Xfinity Series, where he ranks third all-time with 47 race victories. Harvick also won 14 NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series races as a driver and a truck championship as a team owner.
To recognize and honor Harvick’s outstanding career, the NASCAR Hall of Fame recently opened a new Great Hall exhibit entitled, “Kevin Harvick 4Ever A Champion,” displaying the actual race vehicles in which Harvick won five different championships as a driver or an owner, as well as the two title-winning Go Karts, one each from Harvick and son Keelan, all from Harvick’s personal collection.
The vehicles are accompanied by the championship fire suit, helmet, and trophy, as well as photos and a graphic with quotes from Harvick about each title.
This exhibit is a salute to Harvick’s talent, versatility and sustained excellent in more than 25 years of NASCAR competition. The name “4Ever” comes from the No. 4, Harvick’s car number when he drove for Stewart-Haas from 2014-23.
The Vehicles:
It is hard to imagine today, but Kevin Harvick ran the full 1998 NASCAR Winston West Series schedule with a single chassis, encountering only one DNF, which was due to engine failure. Photo courtesy of High Sierra Photo, Kevin Harvick, Inc.
1998 NASCAR Winston West Series Championship
Car: No. 75 Spears Motorsports Chevrolet Monte Carlo
When the 1998 season began, Harvick did not expect to run all 14 races on the NASCAR Winston West Series schedule. But after winning the second race of the year at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, team owners Wayne and Connie Spears gave Harvick the go-ahead to run for a title. He responded by winning five races and posting 11 top-five finishes. Interestingly, the team only had one car, which was raced on every track, including road courses, a 0.375-mile oval and a 2-mile oval.
In 2001, Kevin Harvick captured the first of two series titles in what today is the NASCAR Xfinity Series. Photo courtesy of Richard Childress Racing
2001 NASCAR Busch Grand National Series Championship
Car: No. 2 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet Monte Carlo
In 2001, Harvick was faced with a tremendously difficult challenge: when Hall of Famer Dale Earnhardt (Class of 2010) was killed in a last-lap crash in the season-opening Daytona 500, Harvick was pressed into duty in the Richard Childress Racing Cup Series entry. At the same time, Harvick ran the full NASCAR Busch Grand National Series (now Xfinity Series) schedule in the No. 2 RCR Chevrolet, winning the championship in just his second full season in the series on the strength of five victories and 20 top-five finishes in 33 starts.
A victory at California Speedway (now Auto Club Speedway) won in this blue IROC car was key to Kevin Harvick being crowned the 2002 IROC champion. Photo courtesy of Bryan Blackford
2002 International Race of Champions (IROC) Championship
Car: No. 9 Pontiac Firebird Trans Am
In his first season competing in the International Race of Champions, Harvick won one race and posted three top-five finishes, enough to give him the series championship over a tough field of competitors that included Hall of Famers Dale Jarrett (Class of 2014), Tony Stewart (Class of 2020) and Bobby Labonte (Class of 2020), as well as open-wheel stars Sam Hornish Jr., Al Unser Jr. and Helio Castroneves. This blue car is special to Harvick, because it was also driven in IROC competition by Dale Earnhardt, Dale Jarrett, Mark Martin (Class of 2017), Al Unser Jr. and Eddie Cheever.
Kevin Harvick Inc., the NASCAR team owned by the husband-wife couple of Kevin and DeLana Harvick, captured the 2011 Truck Series Owner’s Championship. Photo courtesy of Chris Trotman/Getty Images for NASCAR
2011 NASCAR Camping World Truck Series Owner’s Championship
Truck: No. 2 Kevin Harvick, Inc. Chevrolet Silverado
In addition to being a championship driver, Harvick was a championship team owner in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series (now NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series). Harvick and his wife DeLana owned a team known as Kevin Harvick Inc., or KHI for short. Hall of Famer Ron Hornaday Jr. (Class of 2018) won Truck Series titles driving for KHI in 2007 and 2009, and in 2011, the KHI No. 2 Chevrolet Silverado, which was piloted by several different drivers including Harvick, delivered the Truck Series Owner’s Championship to KHI.
In the first year of NASCAR’s Championship 4 format, Kevin Harvick emerged as the 2014 Cup Series champion by winning the final race of the season. Photo courtesy of Chris Graythen/Getty Images
2014 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Championship
Car: No. 4 Stewart-Haas Racing Chevrolet SS
After spending 13 years driving for Hall of Famer Richard Childress (Class of 2017), Harvick moved to Stewart-Haas Racing in 2014. Paired with crew chief Rodney Childers, Harvick showed immediate speed, winning at Phoenix Raceway in just his second race with the team. Harvick went on to win five times in the 2014 season, securing the Cup Series championship with a dramatic victory in the season-ending Ford EcoBoost 400 at Homestead-Miami Speedway. In addition to his five race wins, Harvick posted 14 top-five and 20 top-10 finishes on the season.
Photo courtesy of Bryan Blackford
Kevin Harvick International Kart Federation Grand National Championship, 1985
No. 8 Kevin Harvick Go Kart 1985 re-creation
The first championship of any kind for Harvick came behind the wheel of a Go Kart when he was just 10 years old. The cart on display is a re-creation of his original. Each of the other six vehicles in the exhibit were ones that Harvick or his son Keelan actually raced.
Like father, like son: Kevin Harvick and his son Keelan are both national Go Kart champions. Photo courtesy of Kevin Harvick, Inc.
Keelan Harvick United States Pro Kart Series Go Kart, 2022
No. 162 Keelan Harvick Go Kart
Thirty-seven years after his dad became a national champion Go Kart racer, Keelan Harvick won a title, too.
