TALLADEGA, Ala. (September 28, 2003) — At exactly 5:07 p.m. EDT, Matt Kenseth and his No. 17 Smirnoff Ice Triple Black team proved that they’re human after all. In a season full of glittering top-10 finishes, Matt Kenseth finished 33rd in the EA Sports 500 at Talladega Superspeedway after a mechanical failure relegated him to the sideline before the event was over. It is the only DNF for the team so far this year.

Rolling off the starting grid from the first provisional slot of 37th, Kenseth worked his way up through the middle of the pack. By the fifth lap, he was running just outside of the top-10 running order in 11th. On lap 10, the first caution flag of the day waved for a multi-car accident in turns three and four. When the pits opened on lap 14, Kenseth ducked into the pits for left side tires only and the crew sent him back out onto the track.

After a lap 17 restart, Kenseth fell back slightly in the draft before finding the proper line to get to the front. After dropping to 26th on lap 30, he jumped back to 15th by lap 40. Just six laps later and Kenseth powered up to 5th place with teammate Kurt Busch locked tight in the draft behind him. By lap 51 and approaching his second necessary pit stop for fuel, he worked up to second place. One lap later, he led lap 52 as Robbie Reiser kept him on the track for the five extra bonus points. A lap later, he pitted for right side tires and fuel in just 10.57 seconds.

On the ensuing run, Kenseth radioed, “I’m just a little snug [tight] — we need to free the car up a little bit. But just three laps later on lap 66, he radioed the crew again, “I changed my mind, it’s loose enough after all.” And he was on the move again. By lap 68, Kenseth was running 10th and receiving a big push from Dale Earnhardt Jr., who was a lap down at the time due to an earlier pit road accident that damaged several front running cars. Kenseth’s spotter reminded him that the 8 car was a lap down, to which Matt replied, “I know and he’s still bringing us to the front!”

After a daring move on lap 71, Kenseth’s spotter Mike Calinoff remarked for all to hear, “Matt, I don’t know how you do what you do…” Kenseth took over fourth place, then found himself in a six car breakaway draft as they approached another pit sequence. After getting back to second place again, Kenseth pitted on lap 87 for fuel and another set of right side tires. Two laps later, when the caution flag waved again for debris, Reiser kept the No. 17 Smirnoff Ice Triple Black car out on the track.

At the halfway point of the event on lap 94, Matt Kenseth restarted the race in 7th place. Over the next 20 laps, he hovered right around the top-five running order. Though Kenseth had another regularly scheduled pit stop ahead of him, the crew received a shock when he radioed, “I’ve got a left rear tire going down!” He returned to the pits for service ahead of schedule, but the bigger concern was in keeping up with the lead draft pack before going a lap down. It made for some tense moments as he exited the pits and over the next 10 laps. By lap 127, he was running 10th, but had drafting help from the likes of Ken Schrader, Jason Keller, teammate Mark Martin and John Andretti as they furiously tried to catch the lead pack.

Kenseth implored his spotter to get the message to the other cars to line up and run down the lead draft, now over 8 seconds ahead of him on the track. At times, they would make up ground, but then they’d lose ground. Finally, the lead draft pack got to racing each other and allowed the secondary pack to close up right behind them.

On lap 142 the caution flag waved for an accident involving Jimmie Johnson. Kenseth pitted three times over the next three laps, trying to make sure they had enough fuel to stretch their final run for the checkered flag. On the last lap before the restart on lap 147, several of the front-runners ducked down pit road for a splash of fuel, but Kenseth stayed out on the track. In doing so, he inherited 7th place on the restart on lap 148 of the 188-lap event.

He fell back to 10th on lap 150, but then mounted another charge coming up the inside drafting line. He was up to 8th on lap 152, then 4th on lap 153. Kenseth moved up to second place on lap 154 and was knocking on the door of taking the lead from Rusty Wallace when disaster struck the 17 car as he entered the frontstretch tri-oval. A mechanical failure relegated the team to the garage area, where the crew tried in vain to fix the problem and get the car back out onto the track. Unfortunately, the problem was terminal for the car and the team had to retire from the event.

Afterward, an obviously dejected Matt Kenseth spoke with the throng of media who gathered around the team transporter as the crew loaded up the car.

“Something broke in the engine. It’s real disappointing. Up to this point the engine guys have done a really good job this year giving us reliable stuff that runs pretty good, but this restrictor plate stuff has always been our weakness. None of the cars every come here and run. We’ve just got to do more work on this program. We shouldn’t break parts when we run like that. It should be reliable enough to make it, so it’s real frustrating because up to this point we haven’t broken parts. But the guys did a good job. We had ourselves in a good position to get a good finish and we’ll just come back again at Kansas.”

Commenting on the style of racing produced by the two new rule changes for the event, he had this to say:

“We didn’t have a very fast car, you could see that in qualifying. If I had people pushing me and I had myself in the right position, we could run pretty good. But if I had to do anything by myself, we weren’t very good. I was fortunate enough to have a great teammate like Kurt Busch push me all day and Dale Jr. push me all day. Without those guys pushing me, we would have run around the back. The stuff wasn’t real fast and then it broke. It’s real disappointing, but up to this point the motor guys have done a great job giving us reliable stuff. It’s really disappointing we broke today, but up to this point it’s been good. It’s never a relief to break and lose points. Obviously, we have a pretty good point lead and we just need to go race hard the rest of the races and we should be OK, but we can’t have more stuff break. With the lead the way it is, I thought we were plenty conservative on all our stuff but we must not have been because something broke. Hopefully, our stuff will make it to the end for the rest of the year and I think we’ll be OK.”

As for the points, Matt still leads the 2003 Winston Cup point standings by 354 over second place Kevin Harvick with seven events left this season.

• Kenseth not sure he likes all aspects of newest rule
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• Kenseth back at Dover, site of his 1st Cup start
• Cup race a one-man show heading into Dover
• Matt-ematically, points race is over
• DW: Kenseth must stay consistent course
• Consistency key to the Winston Cup points title
• Kenseth in control
• Matt Kenseth: Mr. Excitement
• Kenseth gets ‘A+’ for effort
• Chasing history: Despite his success, Kenseth in uphill struggle to unseat Yarborough

EA Sports 500 • Sunday, September 28
Talladega SuperSpeedway • 2.66 miles • Talladega, Ala.

Matt Kenseth at Talladega:

DATE	START	FINISH	LAPS	WINNINGS	STATUS
4/16/00	42	18	187/188	$50,260	Running
10/15/00	36	10	188/188	$65,100	Running
4/22/01	40	19	188/188	$58,395	Running
10/21/01	24	4	188/188	$77,550	Running
04/21/02	37	30	180/188	$80,905	Running
10/06/02	8	14	188/188	$67,295	Running
4/06/03	28	9	188/188	$104,730	Running

Kenseth on racing at Talladega:

“Our approach this weekend won’t be any different than any other week just because this is a restrictor plate track. You never want to get caught up in someone else’s mess, but hanging back and trying to be too careful doesn’t work either. We’ve had some good runs this year on the plate tracks, save for the Daytona 500, but that was my call to pit before it rained. The other two races were both top-10’s and that’s what we’ll be looking for this time around.”

Crew Chief Robbie Reiser on racing at Talladega:

“We’re bringing chassis 17, which we’ve used in every plate race this year. It’s a good car for us, even though it’s not a good qualifier. It qualifies terrible, but it can sure race in the draft well.”

Notes:

Matt will be driving chassis number MMR-17, which has run all three restrictor-plate races this year

DOVER, DE. (September 21, 2003) — Matt Kenseth made the most of an awful day at the racetrack, coming home in ninth place during the running of the MBNA America 400 at Dover International Raceway. It was an improbable finish, considering that the No. 17 DEWALT Tools Ford ran outside of the top-15 for the majority of the day.

Rolling off the starting grid from the pole after qualifying was cancelled due to Hurricane Isabel, Kenseth could not stand on the gas and quickly fell back with a really loose race car. The first caution flag waved on lap 4 for an incident involving Mike Skinner and Ken Schrader. Nobody pitted and the field took the green on the restart on lap 8. “Too loose,” was the refrain coming from the car radio, over and over again.

Kenseth fell steadily backward as the car continued to get looser and looser. He fell out of the top-10 on lap 35 and had dropped to 14th by the time the next caution flag waved on lap 81. Kenseth pitted for four tires with air pressure adjustments. The team also removed a rubber in the right rear spring and added wedge to tighten the car up.

There was an unusually long caution as NASCAR was called out onto the track surface to re-weld the boilerplate in turn one. In fact, the caution lasted 30 minutes. NASCAR finally turned the field loose on lap 106, and Kenseth restarted in 16th position. Not only was the car still loose after the restart, it was borderline un-driveable. After falling even further to 19th place, Kenseth radioed the crew, “…this is unbelievable.”

Kenseth fought hard as the laps wound on. The leaders were setting a furious pace and when the “saving grace” caution showed up on lap 165, the leader was only two cars away from putting Matt a lap down — something that has only happened twice this whole year. Two laps later, Kenseth brought the No. 17 DEWALT Tools Ford down pit road for service. They put the rubber back in the right rear spring, guessing that their problems might be tire related after all.

After restarting in 15th on lap 173, Kenseth fell backwards again — this time to 17th place before radioing: “tight, tight, tight…” The car had now gone completely opposite on the crew. By the halfway point, the race was shaping up to be a forgettable event for the point leader as they chased the setup on the car.

By lap 224, the car began to settle out a little and Matt Kenseth was able to make a little progress up to 16th place. As the caution waved for debris on lap 235, crew chief Robbie Reiser wisely kept Kenseth on the track to lead a lap, as he was the last car on the lead lap anyway. A lap later, he pitted for four tires and they took a rubber out of the left rear spring. Kenseth restarted in 17th and stayed there throughout the next caution period and subsequent restart. By the lap 325 caution for a wreck involving Kenny Wallace, almost every team was sure they could make it to the end of the race on fuel.

Kenseth restarted in 14th on lap 331, fell back a position, then gained the position back by lap 343. Kenseth was starting to move forward in the field for the first time all day when his closest points race pursuer, Dale Earnhardt Jr. made severe contact with the turn two wall. With just less than 50 laps to go in the event, Matt came down pit road for the final time of the day. Of the 18 cars on the lead lap, Matt was one of nine who pitted. It was a smart choice.

On lap 373 of the 400-lap event, NASCAR turned the teams loose and Kenseth started to move up steadily with his four new tires. With 25 to go, he was sitting in 11th place. Three laps later, he was in ninth. With just 20 laps to go, Kenseth had snuck into eighth place. With less than 10 laps to go, Kenseth lost one more position to teammate Greg Biffle, but brought the No. 17 DEWALT Tools Ford home in ninth place.

It was his 22nd top-10 finish in 28 starts on the year. And it happened on the most improbable of days, considering how the team ran during the event. Afterward, Matt was amazed as he double-checked the leader board, pondering his day.

“We ran terrible. I’m really ashamed of the way we ran. We were just way off. We weren’t very good the whole time we’ve been here. We came in to make changes off the first set of tires and the car was totally different all day. We really struggled, but mainly I’m just worried about Dale, Jr. Hopefully, he’s OK.”

Commenting on his past success at Dover and his love of the one-mile track, he had this to say:

“Yeah, I mean if I had to pick one track on the circuit to come to this would be it. This is my favorite track, but we just haven’t run well lately. When we unloaded this car it was really a last-place car, but we worked on it all the time. We got it a little bit better at times, but it was in no way ever going to be a contender. I don’t know why we’re so far off.