NASCAR: Kevin Harvick to get teammate Tony Stewart’s pit crew (VIDEO)

By Sep 9, 2014, 2:35 PM EDT
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Stewart-Haas Racing has announced that Chase for the Sprint Cup contender Kevin Harvick and Tony Stewart will swap their respective pit crews, effective immediately.

SHR vice president of competition Greg Zipadelli said in a team release that the change was made “in the best interests of the entire organization.”

Zipadelli added: “Our primary goal is to win races and championships, and this pit crew swap provides championship experience to the No. 4 team [Harvick] and continued race-winning experience to the No. 14 team [Stewart].”

Harvick’s now-previous crew has been criticized for multiple mistakes during the 2014 regular season. In last week’s regular season finale at Richmond International Raceway, they were twice unable to keep their man up front during early yellow-flag pit stops.

Brad Keselowski took the lead in the pits on a debris caution at Lap 125, and he never gave up the point again en route to his fourth win of 2014 that also earned him the No. 1 seed in the Chase.

Harvick settled for a fifth-place finish, and afterwards, he was blunt about what it would take to bring home the Cup.

“We’ve gone 26 weeks and haven’t fixed pit road,” he said. “We have to fix pit road in order to win a championship.”

Now, Harvick will have Stewart’s tire changers, tire carriers and jackman from the latter’s 2011 title-winning team: Ira Jo Hussey (front tire changer), Todd Drakulich (front tire carrier), Daniel Smith (rear tire changer), Mike Morneau (rear tire carrier), and Mike Casto (jackman).

The former No. 4 crew – Bryan Jacobsen (front tire changer), Brett Morrell (front tire carrier), Jonathan Sherman (rear tire changer), Josh Sobecki (rear tire carrier), and Getty Cavitt Jr. (jackman) – now joins Stewart’s No. 14 side.

Considering that Harvick’s often-blazing speed this year has been blunted repeatedly by pit woes, SHR’s decision is one that should give him some more peace of mind going into Sunday’s Chase opener at Chicagoland.

Harvick can no longer afford to have races squandered, especially with wins now serving as a ticket to the next Chase round. With these championship-winning crew members now in the 4 camp, he may finally return to being “The Closer” – and at just the right time.

Winner Josef Newgarden earns $3.666 million from a record Indy 500 purse of $17 million

By May 29, 2023, 6:01 PM EDT
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INDIANAPOLIS — The first Indy 500 victory for Josef Newgarden also was the richest in race history from a record 2023 purse of just more than $17 million.

The two-time NTT IndyCar Series champion, who continued his celebration Monday morning at Indianapolis Motor Speedway earned $3.666 million for winning the 107th running of the Greatest Spectacle in Racing.

The purse and winner’s share both are the largest in the history of the Indianapolis 500.

It’s the second consecutive year that the Indy 500 purse set a record after the 2022 Indy 500 became the first to crack the $16 million mark (nearly doubling the 2021 purse that offered a purse of $8,854,565 after a crowd limited to 135,000 because of the COVID-19 pandemic).

The average payout for IndyCar drivers was $500,600 (exceeding last year’s average of $485,000).

Indianapolis Motor Speedway owner Roger Penske, whose team also fields Newgarden’s No. 2 Dallara-Chevrolet, had made raising purses a priority since buying the track in 2020. But Penske but was unable to post big money purses until the race returned to full capacity grandstands last year.

The largest Indy 500 purse before this year was $14.4 million for the 2008 Indy 500 won by Scott Dixon (whose share was $2,988,065). Ericsson’s haul made him the second Indy 500 winner to top $3 million (2009 winner Helio Castroneves won $3,048,005.

Runner-up Marcus Ericsson won $1.043 million after falling short by 0.0974 seconds in the fourth-closest finish in Indy 500 history.

The 107th Indy 500 drew a crowd of at least 330,000 that was the largest since the sellout for the 100th running in 2016, and the second-largest in more than two decades, according to track officials.

“This is the greatest race in the world, and it was an especially monumental Month of May featuring packed grandstands and intense on-track action,” Penske Entertainment president and CEO Mark Miles said in a release. “Now, we have the best end card possible for the 107th Running of the Indianapolis 500: a record-breaking purse for the history books.”

Benjamin Pedersen was named the Indy 500 rookie of the year, earning a $50,000 bonus.

The race’s purse is determined through contingency and special awards from IMS and IndyCar. The awards were presented Monday night in the annual Indy 500 Victory Celebration at the JW Marriott in downtown Indianapolis.

The payouts for the 107th Indy 500:

1. Josef Newgarden, $3,666,000
2. Marcus Ericsson, $1,043,000
3. Santino Ferrucci, $481,800
4. Alex Palou, $801,500
5. Alexander Rossi, $574,000
6. Scott Dixon, $582,000
7. Takuma Sato, $217,300
8. Conor Daly, $512,000
9. Colton Herta, $506,500
10. Rinus VeeKay, $556,500
11. Ryan Hunter‐Reay, $145,500
12. Callum Ilott, $495,500
13. Devlin DeFrancesco, $482,000
14. Scott McLaughlin, $485,000
15. Helio Castroneves, $481,500
16. Tony Kanaan, $105,000
17. Marco Andretti, $102,000
18. Jack Harvey, $472,000
19. Christian Lundgaard, $467,500
20. Ed Carpenter, $102,000
21. Benjamin Pedersen (R), $215,300
22. Graham Rahal, $565,500*
23. Will Power, $488,000
24. Pato O’Ward, $516,500
25. Simon Pagenaud, $465,500
26. Agustín Canapino (R), $156,300
27. Felix Rosenqvist, $278,300
28. Kyle Kirkwood, $465,500
29. David Malukas, $462,000
30. Romain Grosjean, $462,000
31. Sting Ray Robb (R), $463,000
32. RC Enerson (R), $103,000
33.  Katherine Legge, $102,000

*–Broken down between two teams, $460,000 Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing, $105,500 Dreyer & Reinbold Racing/Cusick Motorsports