Matt Kenseth starts the Chase for the Nextel Cup in ninth. Credit: Autostock

Former champion on a tear as Chase begins

Kenseth hoping to win playoff some say he had a hand in creating

The way that Matt Kenseth won his championship in 2003 often is pointed to as the reason NASCAR went to a playoff-style format for its top series.

Kenseth won just one race during his title run, but virtually ran away with what was then the Winston Cup through solid, if somewhat snooze-inducing, consistency.

	Kenseth won at Bristol earlier this season. Credit: Autostock
	Inside the Numbers Matt Kenseth's 10 most recent Cup starts Track Start Finish Points Daytona 38 9 19 Chicago 4 2 16 Loudon 16 10 16 Pocono 30 36 17 Indy 20 5 15 W. Glen 15 18 16 Michigan 13 3 15 Bristol 1 1 11 Fontana 23 7 9 Richmond 13 2 9 Makes the ChaseMatt Kenseth looks ahead now that he is in the Chase Sign up for TrackPass now BUY YOUR NEXTEL DRIVER PHONE

By the time the 2003 season reached the final 10 races, the Roush Racing driver was totally in control and there wasn't much reason for anybody but his own No. 17 team to get excited about it. That was the last straw for NASCAR, which had seen too many points races turn into late-season routs in recent years.

Last year, the first season for Nextel as the title sponsor of NASCAR's elite stock car series, the 10-man, 10-race Chase for the championship was inaugurated. It was a success, with the title battle going to the final lap of the season before Kurt Busch gave team owner Jack Roush his second straight championship.

Five drivers went into the 2004 finale in Homestead, Fla., with at least a mathematical shot at the crown, while Busch, runner-up Jimmie Johnson and third-place Jeff Gordon wound up separated by just 16 points -- the closest title race in NASCAR history.

Kenseth won two races early last season and made it into the Chase, but he never was a factor in the championship, finishing eighth behind teammate Busch.

This year, the five Roush drivers -- including four-time series runner-up Mark Martin, Greg Biffle and Carl Edwards -- make up half the Chase field. And Kenseth is perhaps the most surprising member of that quintet of contenders.

While his teammates ran among the top 10 virtually the entire year, Kenseth had a miserable first half of the season. He managed two top-10 finishes -- eighth at Las Vegas in March and seventh at Dover in June -- through the first 14 races of 2005, falling all the way to 24th in the points following a 32nd-place run on June 12 at Pocono.

A fourth-place finish the next week at Michigan turned his season around and Kenseth charged back into contention for the Chase with nine top 10s, including a victory at Bristol, in his last 12 starts.

Kenseth didn't lock up a spot in the Chase until he finished second to Busch last Saturday night at Richmond, winding up tied with Edwards for eighth.

With the top 10 now separated in increments of five points for the start of the playoff, Kenseth goes into Sunday's Chase opener at New Hampshire International Speedway trailing leader Tony Stewart by 35 points and hotter than anyone except Stewart -- who has 12 consecutive top 10s, including five victories.

"I'm really enjoying this," Kenseth said, grinning. "It's fun to drive these cars. I really think we can be a threat down the stretch."

Kenseth said that even though things were heading in the right direction, he wasn't counting on making it into the title race until it actually happened.

"No matter what, I was going to walk away happy and proud of my guys because we made up 300 and some odd points on 10th place in the last couple of months, and that's awesome, even if we hadn't made it," he said.

Some might think Roush is a shoo-in to win his third straight Cup title, with five drivers in the top 10. But considering how well things have gone in the first 26 races this season, the owner predicts his team is due for some bad luck over the final 10.

Still, he particularly likes the chances of Kenseth, thanks to his experience and the way his team has responded to adversity.

"I think (his experience) is going to loom large," Roush said. "Matt is especially mature and he's calculating. Through all his trials and tribulations this year, he never came to me and said, 'I need this thing that's different' or 'There's a personnel issue' or 'There's a hardware issue.'

"He never raised his hand and said there wasn't on the table the things he need to do his business. He just needed the time for it to work out."

Roush acknowledges he kept prodding Kenseth, asking him if something needed to be changed to get his team turned around, suggesting the possibility of using some of Busch's cars, changing specifications on Kenseth's cars or possibly making a crew chief swap, as the team has in the past.

"I kept poking at it," the owner said. "But he believed in his people and they believed in him and they said, 'Don't bother us. We're going to be fine.' So, they're real solid. They believed in one another when it was tough and they're enjoying their success now that it's not tough."

Kenseth, already enjoying himself, got a big laugh after the Richmond race when someone asked if he thought it would be funny if he won another title with only one victory during the season.

He pointed out that three drivers in the Chase -- Rusty Wallace, Martin and Ryan Newman -- have not won at all this season, adding, "I'll say the same thing I've always said: Consistency still has to be rewarded somehow.

"It's not like football. It's not one team against one team; it's one team against 42. If you run seventh, that's not saying you lost, that's saying you ran seventh and six guys beat you. So, you still have to be rewarded for running good week in and week out," he said.

Kenseth paused and grinned again.

"Do I think it would be funny?" he added. "Yeah, it would be kind of funny."