Dear NASCAR Nation…

As anyone who follows NASCAR knows this week, Monday I wrote a story Kevin Harvick didn’t like. On Thursday, he signed a long-term contract extension to stay with Stewart-Haas Racing, and since then some people in the NASCAR media and drivers have seen fit to chastise the story, its methods and my reporting.

I was hoping a 15-minute interview with SIRIUS XM would set the record straight; I don’t think the media should be the story, but I wanted to clear the air. But the media continues to make it a story, the most recent one posted here by Jeff Gluck of USA Today.

It’s time to take one last stab at the matter and then, I hope, let it rest.

Re: the Harvick situation, here’s what went down. A fellow Frontstretch reporter, Mike Neff, got in touch with me before Dover last weekend regarding a tip he’d heard on Harvick’s future. The tip came from a crewman inside Stewart-Haas Racing, a source used before who said rumors around the shop that the driver was staying with Chevrolet were firing up again. Neff followed that up from a second tip inside the Hendrick organization. This source, who we’ve used in the past, gave a detailed breakdown of how it would work, what Chevrolet was planning and gave Neff the basics.

Neff himself wasn’t at the track at Dover, so he asked me to poke around with people I knew, and, if our sourcing requirements were reached (for Frontstretch, that number is three), felt the rumor was worth mentioning to a wider audience. I said sure; the basic tenets of the story have been out there — and have been repeatedly denied by Harvick — but let’s see what we can find out.

Over the course of the weekend, I had a chance to catch up with people and mentioned what I had heard. I had a longtime friend well-connected within not only NASCAR television but also within NASCAR teams tell me the rumor, also claiming it had been flaring up again over the last week as Harvick had not announced his extension. I also have a source I use frequently, one who works inside the garage as a vendor to multiple teams, verify the rumor, the breakdown of how it would work and that talk on it wasn’t going away.

With that in hand, I went back to Neff as our sources had doubled to four, all from various portions within the industry. He was originally going to mention it in his column after adding more sources on his own — which he did, verifying those people to me. I then included what was discovered as part of a larger story about how we could look back at Dover in several months and say it could be a turning point for a number of drivers. The column was tackled by two editors detached from those sources and given a final look-through.

Here’s what we printed:

Dover’s destruction came during a weekend where rumors returned that Harvick is mulling an offer to leave Stewart-Haas Racing; multiple sources claimed to me at the track the driver’s been approached with an offer to move to Hendrick Motorsports equipment in 2017, a deal that could insert him straight into Kasey Kahne’s No. 5 car. This information isn’t new to NASCAR insiders; it’s been kicked around and strongly denied by both sides. (For the record, Harvick stated this spring, “I’m in the best position I’ve ever been in. It would be pretty tough to walk out on everything we’ve built.”) No one will speak on the possibility as it’s tricky business to execute; Kahne is signed through 2018 and would have to be demoted elsewhere within the HMS chassis/engine hierarchy or have his contract bought out. Harvick, for his part would have to move without crew chief mastermind Rodney Childers who is “locked in” to his current digs at SHR. But the two weeks of calm in Charlotte give thinking time to Harvick in a contract year. It follows several weeks of pit miscues, what-could-have-beens and ground lost to rival Joe Gibbs Racing. Will Harvick look back at this race as the moment where he decided “close” no longer cut it?

Was the rumor true? That question was answered quickly and decisively this week. I’m not stating the facts as if what I did, what was published was the best course of action — I’m merely stating the truth, as it went down because as I said on Twitter that’s all you can give. But let’s be clear; here’s what the column did not do. It did not say, “Harvick has signed to go somewhere else.” It acknowledged previous denials, even adding a quote from Harvick in March in which he reemphasized how happy he was with his current situation. It brought up the contract rumor as an option.

I’ve done plenty right and wrong in my career, but this particular situation feels like a misdemeanor being labeled a Class A Felony. A journalist’s main goal should always be to get things 100 percent right 100 percent of the time, but things happen sometimes — many writers can attest to this. But admitting fault there has made it seem like I don’t take journalism seriously or my chosen profession in sports.

Let me make a few items clear. Frontstretch has been around since 1998, so it’s hardly new on the scene. A staff of 25 writers has each of their columns double edited. I, as editor-in-chief, routinely read the majority of them each week and have a dedicated management staff in place like any other national outlet. We have standards, a style guide, sourcing rules and are proud of our reputation. We even broke a Hendrick story this year, of all things about SunEnergy1 sponsoring the No. 24 car and Chase Elliott. Look at Jayski, one of the more popular NASCAR news sources, and you’ll see the site’s reporting and commentary well represented. The site, through our writers, has won multiple NMPA Awards. I’m also far from new on the scene; I’ve written for national publications, appeared on radio and TV talking NASCAR and had a weekly paid column in some shape or form since 2006. I once went to 28 races a year; I’m not some hack who showed up out of nowhere.

Unfortunately, I’m working a baseball series this weekend that was long ago scheduled so I won’t be at the All-Star Race. But I haven’t shied away from the controversy; I hopped right on SIRIUS XM radio today and gave my take and have done so on Twitter, too. I would be happy to face SHR, Tony Stewart and Harvick face-to-face; I’ll be at Pocono in a couple of weeks.

It’s frustrating to me that other peers have taken this opportunity to attack. I will say I’m not quite sure how much experience I need to “report” according to their standards. I’ve been at this now for a decade; just because I haven’t been at the races for a few weeks means I suddenly can’t be a reporter? That confuses me. It also won’t be the first time athletes will be mad at the media, a song-and-dance that will go on long after all of us are dead and buried. I thought we all had thicker skin. It’s a shame others felt entitled to witch-hunt when one day they, too, may find themselves the center of misinformation and a story that didn’t turn out right. I don’t make it my nature to attack other peers on a personal level and some of what I saw, heard, and worked through yesterday was frustrating. In particular to have someone question whether I was even at the track saddened me.

To debrief tonight I detached and spent some time connecting with two close friends. One just gave birth to their first child; the other has theirs improving in the intensive care unit after a near-death experience that has changed all parties involved. They were moments that gave perspective, a reminder that there are far more important things in life than arguing over the wording on a NASCAR rumor, one presented as such that turned out not to be true.

Today, practice will start for the All-Star Race, Trucks will take to the track and hopefully all can move on. All I can do is apologize to those involved who think I did wrong but I can’t apologize for being who I am. Moving forward, I certainly hope the next story written leads to far less fanfare and a rebuilding of trust to those who felt it was broken. Frontstretch will remain dedicated to bringing you the best news, information, features and commentary in racing from a variety of both writers and perspectives.