Matt Kenseth garnered a pair of Cup victories in 2004. Credit: Autostock

In Review: Matt Kenseth

NASCAR's 2003 champ struggled to defend his championship

CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- Matt Kenseth had a lot to prove.

That might sound funny, since Kenseth won the NASCAR championship in 2003. But the whispers remained, that somehow Kenseth didn't deserve to win the title since he only won one race.

So Kenseth came into the 2004 season hoping to shut a few people up. And after winning two of the first three races, Kenseth's critics were trying to pry their feet out of their mouth.

Matt Kenseth •   2004 Stats •   Driver Page •   Ford Driver's Eye •   Gillette Young Guns Challenge

Kenseth, meanwhile, rolled merrily along, staying in the top five for most of the season as he and his Roush Racing team looked down the road to the Chase for the Nextel Cup.

A second-place finish in the first Chase race positioned Kenseth to make a run at a repeat championship, but it was effectively ended the next week at Dover.

Kenseth made a rare mistake entering pit road, causing his No. 17 Ford to slide and slam into a tire barrier. Kenseth finished 32nd in the race, dropping him from fourth to seventh in the points, and Kenseth couldn't dig out of the hole.

Still, Kenseth finished eight in the final series standings, with two victories, eight top-five and 16 top-10 finishes.

Not bad, but not a championship season, and Kenseth knows it.

"I've probably made some mistakes that I typically don't make, like the Dover pit road thing," Kenseth said. "Things like that, when you know you should do things that are smarter and don't make a mistake. That's probably been one thing.

Matt Kenseth visited Victory Lane at Las Vegas for the second consecutive year in 2004. Credit: Autostock

"I'm not a big believer in luck, but sometimes things just go right and sometimes they go wrong. This year when we had the things go wrong, we couldn't turn it in to be something right."

So instead of saving the car at Dover and recovering to finish, perhaps, in the top 10, Kenseth hit the wall.

"It was just a dumb mistake," Kenseth said. "My right-front tire didn't have any grip, and I should have thought about that because I think I hurt a tire and it wouldn't turn on the track. Then I got loose, and it wouldn't turn at all, and I just couldn't get it stopped."

And with that, Kenseth was put in catch-up mode for the rest of the Chase. An incorrect gear selection -- with Kenseth going for more power -- resulted in a blown engine at Atlanta. And then another blown engine at Phoenix knocked Kenseth down to an afterthought in the championship, but you can't overlook the rest of his season.

The victory at Rockingham was a dominant effort, with Kenseth leading the most laps before nipping Kasey Kahne at the checkered flag. Kenseth then took over the points lead with a repeat victory at Las Vegas.

Kenseth held the lead for four races, posting five top-10s in the first six races.

A blown engine knocked Kenseth down to fifth in points after Talladega, but he reeled off three consecutive top-fives to move back to third.

But somewhere over the summer, Kenseth said his team got behind.

VIDEO Victorious Kenseth celebrates his win in the Nextel All-Star Challenge Close one Kenseth beats Kahne in a photo finish at The Rock •   More Kenseth videos

"We haven't had our cars running good enough," Kenseth said. "Our equipment is better than it's ever been. We've got better stuff to work with than we ever had, but we just got behind in the middle of the year, I think, aerodynamically.

"The 6 and the 16 and them guys really got running good in the middle of the summer, and it seems like we've spent the remainder of the year figuring out what we needed to get caught up to them guys, and so far, we haven't really got it to what we had in 2002 and through the beginning of last year and the beginning of this year, yet."

Still, Kenseth looked to be a good bet as the Chase neared. He was fourth at New Hampshire in July, eighth at Pocono, ninth at Watkins Glen, eighth at Michigan and ninth at Bristol.

Kenseth stood fifth as the Chase started, but after the runner-up finish at New Hampshire, he didn't finish higher than 11th the rest of the season.

"I think the first two-thirds of the season, at least until probably June or July, were a success," Kenseth said. "We started off real strong out of the box. I was able to win a couple of races, win the all-star race, and it seemed like we had some momentum.

"But shortly thereafter we just haven't done as good of a job for whatever reason. I made some mistakes as a driver that got us behind, and we made mistakes as a team that we typically don't make, and it hasn't really been that great of an end of the year, especially the last six or seven weeks."

Kenseth was in the top 10 for all of the 2004 season. Credit: Autostock

Kenseth did manage to post some impressive numbers, though. He was one of only four drivers to stay in the top 10 in points all season, and Kenseth's streak of 71 consecutive weeks there leads active drivers.

Kenseth was one of nine drivers to win two or more races, and ranked eighth in laps led in 2004.

The last few weeks of the season, however, wore on Kenseth, as the travel grind and pressure to win started to bear down. His reign as champion ended at Homestead, so perhaps Kenseth can go back to stealth mode, out of the spotlight like he likes it.

"It's just tough to repeat it," Kenseth said. "I know for us, there's probably things we'd do different with our testing schedules and maybe with my schedule or some of the other things all the team had to do. I think maybe some of that gets to you more than you think it would, but I don't really don't think that hurt our performance a lot.

"I just think it's tough to stay on top of your game all the time. You know, there's rules changing and all the cars are close to the same speed. It's just tough for one or two teams to be able to dominate."