BROOKLYN, Mich. -- How do you balance the frustration of failing to win with arguably one of the best cars against the relief of actually finishing second with it?

You don't have to go any further than Roush Fenway Racing's Matt Kenseth and his crew chief, Jimmy Fennig, to find out.

They battled refueling issues, a shaky pit stop and sub-par restarts in the Heluva Good! 400 at Michigan International Speedway, yet still pulled out a finish good enough to unofficially gain a position in the standings, a tie for sixth with Kurt Busch.

"It was a fuel mileage deal and we're not getting the best fuel mileage," Fennig said as he strode towards his hauler. "So that more or less cost us the whole event, because if we could've raced at the end instead of trying to save gas, we probably would have had lane choice [for two late restarts]."

Kenseth, who was about as cheerless as Fennig, admitted that even having his choice of lanes on restarts, which is the leader's prerogative, might not have made a difference.

"It's frustrating because we had a car I thought we should've won with," Kenseth said. "But we didn't do a good job on pit road at all and I didn't have good restarts, either -- either time."

Kenseth was leading on the penultimate restart, with 38 laps remaining. He had to run half-throttle trying to save fuel on that last run, but he still lined up beside eventual race winner Denny Hamlin.

"I think I lost a spot on each restart, pretty much," Kenseth said. "We just weren't real great on short runs."

Especially the last one.

"I'm happy that there was a caution and we didn't run out of gas and we got to race for the end," Kenseth said. "It was nice to be able to go race, but unfortunately I didn't do a great job on the restart. I spun my tires, Denny saw me hanging back a little bit and took off.

"Once he's clear, it's really hard to pass, especially on a short run like that. The track gets black -- it's all slimy with the new tires, top to bottom. My car wasn't good on a short run, took us about 10 laps. [I] didn't have enough to get around him once he cleared me."

And that wasn't the worst of it, for Kenseth, who said the final 30-lap run taxed his patience.

"It was frustrating, because that last run, you could only run half-throttle because we weren't going to have enough fuel," Kenseth said. "It's no fun to race like that. I was riding around slow, because they said I was two laps short. I wasn't going to save that, but I wasn't going to pit, either [so I was] just running slow, hoping for a caution.

"You try to not get too frustrated because it's a team effort. [You] try not to make tons of mistakes [but it's] at least the third time we haven't got a full fuel, fourth time, something like that [this season].

"We recovered at Texas. We didn't recover at Charlotte [and] it cost us a shot at a win. We did it again here [Sunday]. We got lucky and got a caution so it didn't end up costing us, but it could have. We had a slow pit stop that put us behind. [It's] hard to overcome that."

Kenseth said his team was going to have to work harder on its refueling process. The spiral started on the team's first green-flag stop, about 73 laps into the race.

"Everyone has the same piece of equipment to work with -- I don't think we have an equipment problem, I think we have a problem getting it plugged in right away and making the [fuel can] exchange fast enough," Kenseth said. "So we're getting our tires changed so much faster than the fuel.

"Everybody else on pit road doesn't seem to be waiting for fuel. We drop the jack before it's full. I think that's a problem we have to keep working on internally, I don't think that's a rule or NASCAR problem. Everyone has the same rules and the same pieces. That's up to us to figure out how to do that as good or better than everybody else."

Sunday wasn't the first time this season the fueling issue has bitten a Roush Fenway car, but in the end Kenseth tried to keep it in perspective.

"I'm really happy we ran second, don't get me wrong," Kenseth said. "But it's frustrating when you think you have a car that's capable of winning and you don't win with it."

But once again, Kenseth, Fennig and crew proved their No. 17 Ford squad has developed into a force to be reckoned with. To add to their bad feelings, in their past seven Michigan races, Kenseth had averaged a finish of 9.3; and in his past five starts he'd only led a total of eight laps.

Sunday promised a lot better, as Kenseth led three times for 17 laps, and he was only scored out of the top 10 on two of the 10-lap interval scoring sheets. It marked a solid day overall for Roush Fenway, whose top-three drivers led 115 of 200 laps.

"We had a really fast car and thought we were going to have a chance to win," Kenseth said. "I got a bad restart [with five to go] but Carl [Edwards] pushed me back in there. I got back to Denny but I could not get back around him.

"The car was slower for the first 10 laps and then it seemed like we were the best car. I just didn't have time to get around him. I tried everything I could, but I just could not figure out how to do it."

But he made it a show. Coming off the final corner, to the checkered flag and just off Hamlin's rear bumper, Kenseth's car pitched into what appeared to be a 45-degree yaw. Fennig did crack a smile, at the memory.

"I got one hell of a driver, that's all I know," Fennig said as he turned off and walked into his truck to stow his gear.

Kenseth, in his typical style, was more nonplussed by the save.

"Which one?" he asked, before admitting with a laugh,"It wasn't [that great], really. You have to make it look cool, if you're going to lose, right?"

Related:
Press Pass: Matt Kenseth
Race Rewind: Michigan