Harvick loses chance for win after pit-road mishaps

RICHMOND, Va. -- Todd Berrier, crew chief for Kevin Harvick's No. 29 Chevrolet in the Nextel Cup Series, wishes he could turn back the clock and change everything that happened in the blink of an eye during a pit stop on Lap 253 of Sunday's race at Richmond International Raceway.

But he knows he can't. So he said he will live with Harvick's decent seventh-place finish.

Lap-by-Lap

Jimmie Johnson passed Kyle Busch on a restart on Lap 382 to win the Crown Royal 400 at Richmond Int'l Raceway.

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"Under the circumstances, it could have been a whole lot worse," Berrier said. "You'll take top-10s every week. But you don't get opportunities to win races all that often -- and when you [throw] them away, that's hard to take."

Harvick was leading the race when the sixth caution flag of the afternoon flew because NASCAR officials thought J.J. Yeley had hit the wall. As Harvick attempted to exit his pit box, he ran into the No. 6 Ford of rookie driver David Ragan, turning Ragan and doing some heavy damage to the right front of his own machine. (watch video)

"We just didn't communicate well and wound up getting tore up there," Harvick said.

Berrier added: "We were leaving the pits and we were outside the 2 [car of Kurt Busch]. We were leading at the time and the 2 was running second. We were pitted with the 2 ahead of us. We had to stop a little short, so when we were pulling out of pits the 2 was right beside us and the 6 was on the outside of us and he just kind of turned in and we ended up hitting his left rear and spinning him around.

"It happened so fast. Several things could have happened: we could have just stopped and followed the 2 out; the 6 could have checked up a little and just let us go. But it is what it is, and there's nothing we can do about it now."

Harvick was hot about the accident. But after the race, he still wasn't sure exactly why it had happened.

"I really don't know. Maybe I should have seen him and Todd should have seen him," Harvick said. "It's just one of those things where it happened all at once. It was unfortunate, but the Reese's Chevrolet was strong."

It was strong enough for Harvick to lead a total of 105 laps before the accident. Only Jeff Gordon, who led 114 and ultimately finished fourth, led more laps on the day -- as race winner Jimmie Johnson led the same number as Harvick. (Continued)