The membership of the National Motorsports Press Association elected Kevin Harvick as the 2020 Richard Petty Motorsports Driver of the Year. The latest win is Harvick’s fourth of the award that has been presented yearly since 1969.
Harvick led the NASCAR Cup Series in wins in 2020 with nine. He was the regular-season champion after seven wins in the first 26 races of the season, included a two-race sweep of a Michigan International Speedway race weekend. He won two additional races in the 10-race playoffs, including a second win of the season at Darlington Raceway to start the playoffs. But a wreck that relegated him to a 17th-place finish in the penultimate race of the season at Martinsville Speedway kept him out of the championship four and relegated him to a fifth-place finish in the championship standings.
Harvick received 45 percent of the votes cast for the award. Other drivers receiving multiple votes included 2020 Cup Series champion Chase Elliott, IndyCar champion Scott Dixson and Kyle Larson, who was suspended for most of the NASCAR season but won 46 races on dirt in 2020.
Harvick also won the Richard Petty Driver of the Year Award for his 2001 Cup Series rookie season, his 2014 championship season and 2018.
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