Kasey Kahne finished 40th on Sunday at Fontana.

Promising day ends early for Kahne

Tough car to handle ends day in wall

FONTANA, Calif. -- Kasey Kahne unbuckled his seatbelts without a word, then pulled his sinewy frame from inside his Dodge. On went the sunglasses, shielding a pair of eyes focused downward, toward the ground.

After a quick peek at the damage, he walked with a purpose towards his transporter, still silent. Truth be told, there was nothing to say.

	Fickle Fontana Kasey Kahne's record at California Speedway Race Start Finish Spr. '04 1 13 Fall '04 5 2 Spr. '05 17 40 Kahne spins and makes hard contact with the wall Sign up for TrackPass now BUY YOUR NEXTEL DRIVER PHONE

A possible top-five run had been squandered, and questions as to why weren't answerable. After spending several minutes inside the transporter collecting his thoughts, Kahne emerged, slightly bewildered and utterly frustrated.

"We fought it all day long," Kahne said. "We had a great race car the other day in both practices. It was just a different racetrack today. The car handled a lot differently."

Kahne was 10th in the weekend's first practice, before dropping to 14th in Happy Hour. He qualified 17th. But Sunday, Kahne was a staple of the top 10, and spent much of his time in the top five until Lap 160, when he dove low in Turn 1 to cut off the advance of Jamie McMurray.

"I just lost it getting into Turn 1. Basically, I did it all by myself," Kahne said. "(Jamie) McMurray was coming there on the bottom, and when I went across in front of him, I just lost the back end and spun around, hit the wall."

The damage to the right-front fender of Kahne's Dodge was too extensive to allow him to reenter the event.

"We were working on it, trying to get it better there," Kahne said. "We had gotten it better, but right there (when I wrecked) it was starting to go away again. So we need to go back and figure this deal out.

"It's really disappointing. I don't know what was going on, but there was something wrong with the car."

Kahne called NASCAR's new aerodynamic package -- with an inch-shorter spoiler and softer tires -- into question.

The new rules "didn't seem like a factor when you were around cars. It didn't feel too much different," Kahne said. "But these cars have a lot less grip than they had before. I don't see it being any good for us, really. I think it's just going to make it really tough to race."