FONTANA, Calif. -- Mechanical problems relegated Dale Earnhardt Jr. to a 32nd-place finish in Sunday's Auto Club 500, breaking the momentum of his second-place run in the season-opening Daytona 500.

Earnhardt finished 12 laps down after stopping for extensive repairs on Lap 183.

"We tore up an axle or a drive plate -- one of the two happened first," Earnhardt said. "Down in the center of [Turns] 1 and 2, I just got back to the gas, and the car felt like it had a flat tire. I don't know. Something's going on there where we're chewing that stuff up and tearing it up. We've got to figure out why that's happening. They think it's a material issue, so we'll just have to see."

Asked whether his team was sharing information with those of Hendrick Motorsports teammates Jimmie Johnson (Sunday's race winner), Mark Martin (fourth) and Jeff Gordon (20th), Earnhardt replied, "Of course we are. I can't build the cars. What do you want me to do? I just drive them."

Earnhardt's winless streak reached 59 races since June 2008, his first season with Hendrick Motorsports. He has only one win the last 136 races.

"Looking at the guys around the top 10, we should have been around that No. 16 car [Greg Biffle, who finished 10th] I think," Earnhardt said. "It was a tough day."

Strong debut for new crew chief

Matt Kenseth finished seventh in his first race with veteran crew chief Todd Parrott. Though Kenseth's seventh-place standing in Cup points doesn't match the first-place result after winning the first two races of 2009, the 2003 series champion found reason for encouragement.

"I'm feeling great as far as the two finishes that we've had," Kenseth said. "It sounds dumb, me saying that, since we won the first two last year, but to get out of Daytona with all the troubles we had and finish eighth, and then to come here in Todd's first weekend and finish seventh is pretty good.

"We ran a little worse than some of our teammates at times and a little better at times, and it seemed like we ran as good as most of the Fords did. I still think we've got some work to do to get all of our cars better as a group, but I thought, overall, that our team did a good job."

Parrott agreed.

"I was very, very happy," he said. "I would have liked to have gotten the car closer for Matt, but we just tweaked on it all day long. It wasn't too bad. We've got some work to do. Those guys up front, obviously, have some really fast racecars, but I think we made some huge gains from where we were over the winter, so I think we're heading in the right direction."

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Crew member avoids injury

One of Jamie McMurray's crew members made an acrobatic move to avoid getting run over on pit road in California.

Rear-tire carrier Adam Mosher was trying to grab a loose tire during a pit stop when Kevin Harvick pulled out of the stall right behind McMurray and hit the tire.

Mosher leaped on the hood of Harvick's No. 29 Chevrolet to avoid getting hit himself. The crew member avoided injury when he landed on the car and pushed off with his right foot. He then jumped back to the pavement and got out of the way of the other cars coming down pit road since McMurray and Harvick had the stalls closest to the end of pit road.

"That was my only option. There is probably a big dent in his hood right now," Mosher said. "I wasn't trying to do it on purpose. I just had to get out of the way."

Both teams were penalized on that stop during a caution. McMurray's team was penalized for losing control of the tire and, Harvick, who had been third, was caught speeding at the entrance to pit road and restarted 26th.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.