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2014 NASCAR Cup Series champion Kevin Harvick has been known to not mince his words when it comes to opinions on racing. The Stewart Haas Racing driver has been at the forefront of speaking on many issues over the years.
Harvick recently voiced his opinion about race distances, which need to be shorter according to the 46-year-old. Harvick made an appearance on journalist Davey Segal's podcast last week and elaborated on his take on race lengths, and said:
“The thing that people have to realize, there’s going to be a lot more cautions. It’s not the racing that we’ve had for the past several years with a limited amount of cautions. There’s going to be a ton of cautions as we’ve seen through all these races. I don’t think, from a driver’s standpoint, any of us want to race 500-mile races anyway."
The Bakersfield, California native, inadvertently mentioned the younger drivers' style of racing with maximum aggression which led to the said caution flags. He went onto explain further and took the race in Atlanta as an example, saying:
“500 miles at Atlanta with a restrictor plate. That was a long day. It felt like we were in there forever. I think the Daytona 500, obviously, needs to be 500 miles but the Coke 600 could be debated. But the rest of these races they shouldn’t even allow them to have 500-mile races. They, to me, seem like a thing of the past.”
Listen to the podcast below:
While acknowledging the historical significance of races such as the Daytona 500 and its 500-mile long race distance, other races could be cut short in Harvick's opinion.
Hailie Deegan agrees with Kevin Harvick on shorter races, but for different reasons
NASCAR Camping World Truck Series driver Hailie Deegan seems to agree with Cup Series veteran Kevin Harvick's take on shorter races. The 20-year-old rising female star thinks the governing body should take into account the shorter attention span of the younger generation.
Deegan went onto back herself up by saying that nothing usually happens until the last stage of Cup Series races. She was also of the opinion that a four-hour-long race is excessive for fans to sit through 36 times a year.
Many traditional NASCAR fans are bound to disagree with Kevin Harvick and Hailie Deegan, but that doesn't mean there isn't a younger audience that does agree.
