Tough as it was to pass at Texas Motor Speedway on Monday, Matt Kenseth knew there was only one sure place to take the lead for keeps–in the pits, under the final caution flag.
“I wanted to make it so the race would be mine to lose,” Kenseth said after winning the Samsung/Radio Shack 500, which had been postponed because of rain on Sunday in Ft. Worth. “I wanted to see what I could do from up there.”
So he had his crew change only two tires. Most other top contenders did the same. But Kenseth’s crew gave him a bonus, getting him out of the pits in first place, just ahead of Jeff Gordon.
“I was worried about my restart, and whether Jeff might get under me in the first few laps of green [when the race went green with 22 laps to go],” Kenseth said.
But he held off Gordon with greater ease as the laps waned. It was a pleasant feeling for Kenseth, who’d been forced to start last in the 43-car field for changing engines in his Ford after qualifying.
“Once I got a little cushion, I felt pretty good about it,” said Kenseth, a 30-year Cambridge, Wis., driver who collected his second victory of this, his third Winston Cup season. “It was tough to be behind somebody.”
“It’s all about getting clean air to the nose of the car,” Gordon said, meaning the phenomenon drivers call “aero push.”
Kenseth explained: “When you get behind somebody it takes all the downforce off the front.” That is, the lead car diverts onrushing air so that not much streams down onto the second car’s nose and hood. That causes the front to lose traction.
There were seven cautions in the race, which was attended by a crowd estimated at 180,000, but no serious injuries. The hardest crash occurred when Dale Earnhardt Jr. was clipped by Shawna Robinson as he was attempting to lap her. Earnhardt’s car spun and slammed into the wall backward, but he walked away from the crash.
Ed Hinton.
– Walker Racing, unable to obtain sponsorship for a full Indy Racing League season, cut ties with Sarah Fisher, the third woman to race in the Indianapolis 500. Fisher, 21, earned $1.04 million in 22 starts for Walker Racing.
– Sprint-car driver Jimmy Johnston, 48, died of a head injury after his car crashed into a wall at Eldora Speedway in Rossburg, Ohio, at more than 80 m.p.h. and rolled more than 10 times.