Kevin Harvick has spent the better part of his NASCAR career treading up against that fine line between confident and cocky.

In fact, after he took over in Nextel Cup for Richard Childress Racing in 2001 under impossible circumstances after the death of Dale Earnhardt, for a while, his youthful exuberance often lured him to the wrong side of that demarcation.

But he backed it up on the track, winning the Busch Series championship and doing an admirable job in the Cup car to earn the Richard Petty Driver of the Year Award from the National Motorsports Press Association.

“I have been on the arrogant side of it and the cocky side of it,” Harvick admitted Sunday after winning the Sylvania 300 at New Hampshire International Speedway and taking the lead in the Chase for the Nextel Cup. “I know that you don’t want to stick your foot in your mouth.

“Maybe at the end of the year I can be a little bit proud of what (I’ve) done. But we don’t want to fall on our face.”

The relevant term in this discussion is “swagger.”

Swagger, best defined, is an air of invincibility. When it is projected from a team or athlete on a roll, it is immensely compelling. Think of Tiger Woods at a major golf championship. Duke basketball. Bob Gibson on the pitcher’s mound (if you’re not at least my age, ask your dad). Any truly great NFL quarterback.

For a generation, Indiana basketball fans believed Bob Knight was an acceptably intense genius.

He had swagger. Most everyone else saw Knight as a jerk.

Harvick might have come across similarly to some, especially during the past couple of years, when racing has been more of a struggle.

Harvick was fifth in the final standings in 2003, his third year in Cup, but in each of the past two he’s finished 14th and missed the Chase.

There’s no question Harvick’s No. 29 Chevrolet team at RCR has improved every aspect of its program this year. He has four victories and 12 top-five finishes this year after having eight total in 2004 and 2005.

There’s also no question Harvick’s bravado, along with the stresses that tug and pull and jerk on a NASCAR team when it’s not running well, nearly tore his team apart.

Harvick spent the early part of this season deciding he wanted to stay right where he has always been in NASCAR’s top series, passing on the opportunity to jump to one of the new Toyota teams coming in next year and on other potential deals.

With that decision made, and with a corner apparently turned in what was a long fight to get RCR back into the sport’s competitive mainstream, clearly now more things are pulling Harvick’s team together than prying it apart.

The result?

Two straight Cup victories, first place in the Chase and a huge lead in the Busch standings.

The Chase is still anyone’s game. Right now, though, Harvick and crew chief Todd Berrier have momentum and plenty of recent success to build upon. Most importantly, they have begun to believe they’re just as capable as anybody of winning it all.

That makes them dangerous.