Harvick Holds Off Edwards, Wins at Phoenix

Kevin Harvick is so good at Phoenix International Raceway that he wins races even when he probably shouldn't.

While the 1-mile oval isn't known for fierce tire wear, over a two-lap shootout, a driver with two fresh tires should be able to pass another driver who has nearly 75 green-flag laps on his.

But Harvick was able to hold off Carl Edwards -- just barely, by 0.01 seconds -- to capture the Good Sam 500 for his fifth win in the past six races at PIR.

"I just like racing here," Harvick said. "It's just one of those places where I feel like I've been here enough times to where I can move around and find something to make our car work.

"We struggled a lot this weekend to get the balance where we wanted to, but we knew the feel that we were looking for."

While it appeared Harvick had that feel he needed over the second half of the race, as he led a race-high 139 laps, it was the last two laps that he led that were the most impressive.

Edwards started fourth on the green-white-checkered restart, with Harvick and Dale Earnhardt Jr. in front of him and Austin Dillon beside him -- the only drivers who had stayed out and did not pit after a Kasey Kahne crash brought out the caution with five laps to go. Edwards felt good, considering he had the two fresh right-side tires.

And still Edwards couldn't win. Edwards admitted it would take a while to get over the loss at Phoenix. He knew going into that restart that in some ways, even though he was fourth, it was his race to lose.

"He was pretty fast, even on old tires," Edwards said of Harvick. "Once we got clear, I thought we were going to get one shot. I tried to go to the outside of him and he blocked a little bit, and I didn't have anywhere to go but rub him a little bit."