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[/media-credit]Consistancy is what led Kenseth to his championship in 2003 and so far has led him to being second in points so far this year. At the end of the FedEx 400 benefiting Autism Speaks, Kenseth came home with a third place finish.
“Our finish was really good,” Kenseth says. “Our end result, can’t really complain about that. We just kind of missed all day. Good thing we qualified good yesterday. Kept some track position.
“So my car was really tough to pass with the setup that we had in it. Just really struggled getting the balance we needed to run fast. So got way off on time in the race and Jimmie did a good job of recognizing what we did and got the car back to where we could keep up with everybody except for the 24 and the 48.”
Kenseth had to battle hard as on the restarts, he didn’t seem to get going on the restarts. Kenseth says that seemed to be a theme throughout the day as anybody underneath eventual race winner Jimmie Johnson couldn’t get going.
“Everybody starting underneath him, it was tough to get going,” he says. “A couple cars would get by you every time. I was able to get back by (Dale Earnhardt) Junior in that last restart starting behind Jimmie.”
Kenseth adds that it seems to always be like that, though, no matter the track, with the leader being in control of the restarts.
“The leader dictates when you go and can’t go until he does, and you know, they were really fast and he was really good at that and by the time he gets going you recognize that and try to get going, he’s already pulling away from you,” Kenseth explains. “It’s tough. It’s easier to be a row back because you can kind of watch him when he gets rolling and you can roll toward him but when you’re underneath him, it makes it difficult. At least for me it does.”
Leaving Dover, Kenseth now only sits one point behind points leader and teammate Greg Biffle.
“I feel good about our position,” he says. “Obviously I mean early in the year, you wants to be as high as you can in the points, obviously if we make the Chase, they rack up by wins and so that’s really what you look at right now.”
However, he also knows that they will need to do their homework based on how strong both Johnson and Jeff Gordon were throughout the day.
