Kenseth drops to ninth after 35th-place finish

Two blown tires plague No. 17 team's effort at The Monster Mile

DOVER, Del. -- Matt Kenseth survived one bullet, but the second went right through his heart.

Kenseth finished 35th at Dover after he crashed with just 32 laps to go, ruining a sure top-10 finish that would have had him in the thick of the title chase with just eight races to go.

Inside the Chase Point standings after Dover No. Driver Pts. Behind 1. J. Johnson 5,362 -- 2. R. Wallace 5,355 -7 3. R. Newman 5,350 -12 4. M. Martin 5,341 -21 5. T. Stewart 5,339 -23 6. G. Biffle 5,339 -23 7. J. Mayfield 5,281 -81 8. C. Edwards 5,259 -103 9. M. Kenseth 5,238 -124 10. Ku. Busch 5,192 -170 • Official results, click here • Official standings, click here Final lapsKurt Busch struggles and a green-white-checker finish Flat MattChase driver Kenseth has two separate tire issues MBNA RacePoints 400Get all the highlights from The Monster Mile Sign up for TrackPass now BUY YOUR NEXTEL DRIVER PHONE

A flat tire -- Kenseth's second of the day -- sent him into the wall on Lap 368 and the finish dropped him to fifth to ninth in the points.

He had entered Dover just 50 points out of the lead, but the DNF swelled that deficit to 124.

Kenseth was cruising along in fifth when he struck a large piece of debris on Lap 217, forcing him to pit under green. It took nearly 100 laps, but he got the lap back and was running in the top 10 before the second tire failure ended his day.

Kenseth pulled his Ford into the garage, but the team didn't have enough time to get the car back out to make any laps.

"I'm going to walk away [Sunday] knowing I gave 100 percent. It didn't turn out like we wanted to, but everybody put in all the effort they could," Kenseth said. "We had a competitive car and were in decent position to get a good finish but it just wasn't meant to be."

It was Kenseth's first DNF in 15 races, and he said he wishes he would have pitted before the second tire failure.

"They tell me it's my imagination and that there was nothing wrong with them, so I decided to run a couple of laps," Kenseth said. "I should have trusted my first instinct."

Dover easily is one of Kenseth's favorite tracks, and he badly wanted to win at Dover, where he made his Cup debut in 1998. Simply put, it was not the track where Kenseth expected to have problems.

With Kenseth trying to win his second championship in three years, the Chase format makes it difficult to absorb a 35th-place finish.

"I'm not even worried about that. I'm worried about trying to win races and run up front," Kenseth said. "I can only control so much and try to run the best we can every week and see where it ends up. I'm not even thinking about that right now."

What makes it worse is that Talladega is coming up, and Kenseth always is less than enthusiastic about heading to Alabama.

"I hope I don't hit anything," Kenseth said. "It's the same as always when we think about Talladega, but I think we've got better cars than we've ever had for our speedway program."