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« Reply #2 on: November 06, 2007, 03:51:13 pm » |
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Valliant Effort Comes Up Short for Kenseth at Texas Matt Kenseth and the No. 17 USG Sheetrock/DEWALT Ford Fusion Racing Team Texas Motor Speedway/November 4, 2007
Fort Worth, Tex. (November 4, 2007) -- Matt Kenseth put on one of the best driving displays you’ll ever see in the waning laps of Sunday’s race at Texas Motor Speedway. Kenseth was leading when Jimmie Johnson caught him with 19 laps remaining. Johnson was much faster and on four fresh tires, compared to Kenseth’s two, and appeared as if he would make short work of the No. 17 USG Sheetrock/DEWALT Ford Fusion. But Kenseth, fighting a loose racecar, fought Johnson off, corner after corner, for the next 17-and-a-half laps, sliding sideways on several occasions and making contact once; doing everything he possibly could do to keep Johnson behind him. Until coming out of turn two, heading to the white flag, Johnson finally cleared Kenseth as was able to pull away. For the second time at Texas this season, Kenseth had to settle for second after a memorable late-race duel.
In front of a Texas-sized crowd of over 150,000, Martin Truex Jr. led the field to the green flag for Sunday’s race at 3:37 PM Eastern. Kenseth rolled off 18th and knew that he had his work cut out him. Kenseth was happy with the car on Friday, but felt it needed improvement from the final two practice sessions on Saturday.
By the time Kenseth came to pit road for the first time under caution on lap 16, he had worked his way up to the 13th position. Robbie Reiser made the call for two tires and returned the No. 17 Ford back to the track in the fourth position.
Kenseth reported the car being loose on entry into the corners, but tight in the middle and a little too free off the corner. It was a condition that Kenseth fought for much of the evening, but as the race wore on Reiser and company made the adjustments necessary to improve the handling.
During the early stage of the race, the field was shuffled because of different pit strategies. After another two-tire stop on lap 37, Kenseth was running in the 19th position because of the number of cars that had stayed out.
The first green-flag stop of the day occurred on lap 88. Kenseth was running in the 16th position when the cycle of stops began and thanks to a solid stop by the “Killer Bees,” he cycled out in the 14th spot.
For the next 80 laps, Kenseth toiled between the 11th and 15th position until lap176 when he was finally able to break into the top 10. Reporting that he needed more grip because he was still “tight in the center and loose off,” Kenseth came to pit road under green on lap 189, cycling in 10th and cycling out in the eighth position.
The stop of the day came under caution on lap 214 when Kenseth drove onto pit road in the sixth position and after a 12.25-second, four-tires-and-fuel stop, emerged in the second position.
When the field restarted on lap 218, Kenseth immediately charged to the high side of the leader in turn one and grabbed the lead coming off of turn two. Kenseth kept the blue and red USG Ford out front until a pit stop on lap 274 under caution, with only 59 laps remaining. Kenseth returned to the track in third when Reiser sent word that, just like last week in Atlanta, he needed to “conserve fuel.”
Thankfully, it would not come down to fuel strategy as a caution on lap 298 regrouped the field and sent them to pit road for the final stop of the evening. The call was made for two tires and fuel in order to maintain track position with 30 laps to go. But, only four or five cars took on two tires and the rest elected for four.
Kenseth restarted second but immediately went to the high side again in turns one and two to take the top spot away and begin to set sail. Knowing that cars with four fresh tires would be coming soon, Kenseth pressed as hard as he could to build the largest lead possible before those cars cleared traffic.
On lap 315, just 19 laps from the finish, Johnson had closed onto Kenseth’s rear bumper and appeared poised to make the pass for the lead with relative ease. Kenseth radioed the crew, “If I run any faster, I’ll wreck it.” But, what Kenseth managed to do over the final 19 laps was nothing short of amazing.
Admittedly driving over his head, Kenseth used every inch of the race track and every trick in the book to keep the faster car behind him. Since Kenseth knew his car was loose off the corner, he kept Johnson below him on the race track which allowed Kenseth to keep the down force he needed for handling and, at the same time, quell Johnson’s momentum off the turns. This familiar duel, virtually identical to the spring race when Kenseth held off Jeff Burton for 15 of 16 laps at the end to the race, lasted for the next 17 laps, with Kenseth holding the high line and Johnson challenging down low, but never quite able to make the pass.
At one point with four laps to go, Johnson appeared as if he may have finally cleared Kenseth when the No. 17 Ford jumped sideways off of turn four. But, Kenseth stayed on the gas and motored alongside Johnson as the two made slight contact heading into the tri-oval.
Alas, for everything that Kenseth did, Johnson, whose car was faster at the time and on fresher left-side tires, finally cleared Kenseth as the two entered the back stretch while coming to the white flag. Once around Kenseth, Johnson was able to hold him at arms length and Kenseth had to settle for second – a second straight time at Texas.
"I just saw him closing in on me,” Kenseth said. “He was way faster than me. He had four and we had two. I think two is definitely the right call. I thought we got out there so far we were going to have a shot, but you can just never count them guys out. Jimmie's just a great race-car driver and Chad does a great job on the box, and they have much confidence and they got four tires on it. I can't believe more people didn't get two. That would've helped us a little bit. But I saw him coming, did everything I could to hold him off. I was too loose anyway, and those two tires just couldn't hang on to it."
AT THE END YOU ALMOST LOST IT A COUPLE OF TIMES. WAS THAT A CONCERN? "I was probably a little too far over my head. If I had to do it over again and I knew I was going to get beat, I probably wouldn't have ran Jimmie quite as hard as I did, because I thought I lost my car once and probably would've taken him with me. But, Jimmie's a great driver, I knew he was probably going to be pretty patient, racing for the championship, and we haven't won in forever. So, we were racing hard, trying to keep the win and just couldn't do it."
NEXT UP: Checker Auto Parts 500 One-mile Phoenix International Raceway Avondale, Ariz. Sunday, Nov. 11, 2007
About Roush Fenway Racing
Roush Fenway Racing is NASCAR’s largest team operating 14 motorsports teams, five in NASCAR NEXTEL Cup with drivers Matt Kenseth, Jamie McMurray, Greg Biffle, Carl Edwards and David Ragan; five in the Busch Series with Kenseth, Biffle, Edwards, McMurray, Ragan, Todd Kluever, Michel Jourdain Jr. and Danny O’Quinn Jr.; and three in the Craftsman Truck Series with Edwards, Peter Shepherd, Travis Kvapil, Erik Darnell and T.J. Bell; and one in the ARCA/REMAX Series with Colin Braun and Darnell.
~RFR
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