Ron Hornaday credits Kevin Harvick Inc. with driver's fourth career Truck title
By Kenny Bruce - Assistant Managing Editor
Monday, November 16, 2009
Ron Hornaday celebrates clinching his fourth NASCAR Truck series championship Friday night at Phoenix International Raceway.
David Griffin
NASCAR Scene
Related stories: Truck race winner Kevin Harvick enjoys stellar night in Phoenix - as both owner and driver
Kevin Harvick Inc.'s Ron Hornaday wins 2009 Truck series championship
AVONDALE, Ariz. – First. Second. First. Not bad numbers for consecutive races. But it’s even more impressive when those numbers signify your finishing position in points.
Ron Hornaday did it again, winning the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series championship for his fourth career title and his second in the last three years. The 51-year-old native of Palmdale, Calif., wrapped up the series’ championship by finishing fourth in Friday night’s Lucas Oil 150 at Phoenix International Raceway.
Matt Crafton, second in points, finished eighth, leaving Hornaday with an insurmountable 215-point advantage with one race remaining.
Hornaday has now won two titles with Kevin Harvick Inc. (2007 and ’09) to go with the titles he won in 1996 and 1998 while driving for Dale Earnhardt Inc. He fell just seven points short of winning the 2008 crown, eventually coming up short against Johnny Benson Jr.
“It took me 30 years to do it,” Hornaday said when asked about wrapping up this year’s title early.
“If you look at the year, we had a pretty good points lead, and then we ended up blowing a tire at Dover and Matt caught us. Then we had another bad race and ran out of fuel.”
That short stretch early in the season allowed Crafton to take the points lead, but Hornaday and his KHI team came back with a vengeance.
A five-race stretch from mid-June until early August saw the No. 33 team win a series-record five consecutive races, equaling a mark reached by only two other NASCAR drivers, Richard Petty and Bobby Allison (1971). Petty holds NASCAR’s all-time record for consecutive wins with 10, set in 1967.
As a result, when the series rolled into Bristol in August, Hornaday was sitting on a 216-point lead with 11 races remaining. And he finished sixth or better in seven of the last 10 races to maintain a healthy points advantage.
“The last three years, I’ve gone to Homestead so stressed out,” said crew chief Rick Ren. “Now, I can go to Homestead and race.
“It’s really cool. The last three years, we’ve got two championships and a second. I can’t say enough about this team. These guys are really good. [Owners] Kevin and DeLana [Harvick] give us all this stuff to work with. What can you say about Hornaday? He speaks for himself.”
Harvick called Hornaday “the catalyst of everything that has turned this team into championship caliber.”
“You know [I] don’t have to worry about what is happening from the driver’s seat,” Harvick said. "You know that everything is coming out of the driver’s seat that is absolutely possible. From there, we have build a team around him that was capable of giving him the trucks he needed.
“It’s fun to watch, and Ron is a great friend of mine. To win a second championship with him is pretty cool.”
Crafton, driver of the ThorSport Racing Chevrolet, has yet to visit the winner’s circle this year, but he kept pressure on Hornaday by reeling off top-10 runs in seven consecutive races heading into Phoenix. But in the end, Hornaday’s margin was too big to overcome.
“It has definitely been a good year,” Crafton said. “But we haven’t had a great year. We came up short from victory lane. We should have been there definitely a few times and came up short. We’ve got to capitalize on that stuff next year. We will.”
Hornaday may have the drivers’ title put away, but there’s another trophy he’s still hoping to secure. The KHI team currently leads Billy Ballew Motorsports and driver Kyle Busch by 60 points in the battle for the owners’ championship.
“That shows how good our team is, and Kyle has been really racing strong,” Hornaday said. “He has six or seven wins this year. So we are going to do what we can to hold them off … have a little fun and race a little different.”
He may be 51, but Hornaday says the equipment provided to him by KHI “makes you feel like you’re 18 years old.
“You feel young. … It just makes me feel like a hero,” he said.
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4 responses to "Ron Hornaday credits Kevin Harvick Inc. with driver's fourth career Truck title". Post a Comment.
b48orr said:
Nov 16, 2009 at 9:42 AMThe five wins in a row was quite a feat! In any racing at any level five wins in a row is something special! That was what really turned Rons season around and stretched it out. Congratulations to KHI and Ron Hornaday on a great season. Rick Ren and the team also! Another Chevy championship!!
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» Confirm Abuse ReportRACER2828 said:
Nov 16, 2009 at 3:55 PMRon Hornaday is one of the few class acts left in racing. He has been a class act since his early days on the short tracks in So. Cal. Congrats to Ron, Rick Ren and the whole KHI Company. Stand by 2010 #5.
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» Confirm Abuse Reportlfowler said:
Nov 16, 2009 at 4:05 PMMy very favorite team in racing is KHI, Ron Hornaday and Rick Ren. I love you guys and I am so proud of what Kevin and Delana have achieved with Ron and Rick.
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This feature is intended to allow you to report comments that are abusive in terms of foul/vulgar language, harassment, racial/religious prejudice and any words/phrases of a related nature. This feature should not be used to report users who simply make a comment about your favorite driver, with which you do not agree. Commenting is a forum in which we can all express our opinions. Reporting abuse of others should be done with this in mind.
» Confirm Abuse Reportmom1159 said:
Nov 17, 2009 at 10:05 PMCongrats to KHI, Ron and the whole team and company- it's great to have another championship- always a fan
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