Skip to content
Sports
Link copied to clipboard

NASCAR at Pocono: Ross Chastain wins Gander RV 150; Kevin Harvick on pole for Sunday’s Gander RV 400

In addition to Saturday's competition, Pocono Raceway announced a planned NASCAR doubleheader for 2020.

Ross Chastain, the eighth-generation watermelon farmer-turned-NASCAR driver, won Saturday's Gander RV 150 and celebrated with a watermelon on hand.
Ross Chastain, the eighth-generation watermelon farmer-turned-NASCAR driver, won Saturday's Gander RV 150 and celebrated with a watermelon on hand.Read moreDerik Hamilton / AP

LONG POND, Pa. -- Ross Chastain won the Gander RV 150 truck race early Saturday afternoon, and it wasn’t close, as he led for 54 of the 60 laps after beginning in the outside starting position.

Chastain’s No. 45 car overtook Austin Hill on the first lap of the race, when a Turn 1 collision took Stewart Friesen out of contention, and with the exception of six Harrison Burton-led laps during Stage 2, he never looked back.

The win is his second of the season, after winning at Kansas back in May — it would have been his third, but his win four weeks ago at Iowa Speedway was taken away after post-race inspection found his truck to be illegal, a ruling that drew the public ire not only of Chastain, but also of Niece Motorsports owner Al Niece.

“After the race, [my team] grabbed me and said, ‘Listen, don’t say anything stupid. ... Just be you. Do your interview, but just be you, don’t get caught up in the racing drama,’ ” Chastain recalled.

Following his post-win burnout, Chastain, nicknamed ‘The Melon Man’ because of his family of watermelon farmers, went to celebrate in front of fans in the grandstand, where he threw a massive watermelon beach ball that he’d stowed in his truck into the crowd.

To add to the spectacle, standing on the checkered finish line, he smashed a real watermelon, from which he promptly took a bite before heading to victory lane.

“That was all a dream come true,” Chastain said. “That was all the preparation. That’s why we get up everyday, it’s to fight and to prepare to win. We have a fast race truck and people that believe in each other.”

Chastain admitted, along with crew chief Phil Gould and general manager Cody Efaw, that his team is cash-strapped with regard to sponsorship dollars, but the win on Saturday ensured that he would continue racing. Efaw could hardly contain himself when Chastain denied that he felt like a driver to beat over the course of the rest of the season, evidently happy with Chastain’s new commitment to let his driving do the talking.

Chastain went on to participate in qualifying for the Gander RV 400, where he finished 35th of 38 drivers.

Harvick wins the pole

The qualifying session saw Kevin Harvick’s Busch No. 4 car win the pole for Sunday’s race. Harvick currently sits third in the Cup Series standings, and he’s just one week removed from a win at New Hampshire. Pocono is one of just two tracks where Harvick has yet to secure a Cup win.

“[Sunday], it’s going to take a fast car, but it’s also going to take everything falling your way so you can get the pit strategy right,” Harvick said. “It has been a really good track for me, and my guys and really the whole company know we’d love to cross this one off.”

Despite winning the pole, Harvick knows that there’s much work left to do if he wants to get that elusive first win at the tricky triangle. He said that he paid close attention to Saturday’s Gander RV 150 in order to determine whether or not he would try to utilize the PJ1 traction compound that has been applied in the third lanes of Turns 1 and 3 and the second lane of Turn 2.

“I still think the preferred groove is going to be the bottom of the race track," he said. "I don’t think the race was where everybody wanted it last time. I think the PJ1 is going to be an improvement.”

Joey Logano, Aric Almirola, Erik Jones, and Auston Dillon rounded out the top five in qualifying.

More racing at Pocono

Pocono Raceway announced its plans for a 2020 NASCAR doubleheader, whose tentative schedule features four races, as well as practice and qualifying sessions, from Jun. 25-28, 2020. The races include a NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series 200, as opposed to this year’s 150; a NASCAR Xfinity Series 225; and two NASCAR Cup Series races, only one of which has a set distance, at 350 miles.