Matt Kenseth and his new supporters in the media are missing the point about his back-to-back victories and return to the top of the Nextel Cup point standings.
They call it strong rebuttal of his “critics” during last year’s run to the final Winston Cup while winning only one race.
Look back closely, and you’ll see Kenseth himself wasn’t criticized nearly as much as the NASCAR point structure.
It was in disrepair, but now it has been fixed, and Kenseth is off and running within a new and liberating system:
He is free to win. He has breathing room in the structure.
He is having “the most fun I’ve ever had driving a race car,” he said after Sunday’s victory at Las Vegas–and that’s saying a lot for a driver who started out as a teenager on the rollicking short-track tour of Wisconsin, where there’s far more joy than pressure.
Now both Kenseth and team owner Jack Roush will tell you this surge out of the box is largely because of the new technological relief Ford is getting from NASCAR: more horsepower from new cylinder heads, and better aerodynamics with new nose and tail configurations for the Taurus.
They also tout Roush Racing’s unprecedented engine-development alliance with their once-bitterest rival among Ford teams, Robert Yates Racing.
Kenseth remained adamant this week that “I don’t think we can try any harder than we were trying last year,” and that his equipment is simply better now.
But even with the tech improvement, without the points changes, Roush and Kenseth still would be laboring under the old cardinal rule of championship contenders: Whatever you do, don’t get into trouble. Don’t wreck; don’t wear out your car.
NASCAR drivers never admit it–they’ll all tell you they run as hard as they can, all the time–but avoiding trouble discourages the calculated risks that win races.
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Under the old Winston Cup points structure, winning races and winning championships were becoming almost mutually exclusive. In 2002 Kenseth won the most races on the tour, five, but wound up eighth in the standings. In ’03 he came back and did it the opposite way.
Now he can have it both ways, be a big winner and a champion in the same year.
Kenseth’s start is early vindication of the new NASCAR math. Further, his best bud and longtime rival, Dale Earnhardt Jr., is an equal but opposite example.
After winning the Daytona 500 and finishing fifth at Rockingham, N.C., Earnhardt had a miserable day at Vegas, with a Chevrolet that was handling so fitfully that he chronically limped in and out of not only the pits, but the garage, for repairs.
Earnhardt finished 35th and fell to seventh in the standings. But that wasn’t nearly the stumble it would have been last year.
For both Kenseth and Earnhardt, all that matters toward the championship is being in the top 10 in points after 26 of the 36 races. At that point, NASCAR will bunch up the top 10 statistically–with an easily surmountable 50 points separating first place from 10th–then turn them loose for a sprint to the finish of the season.
Often, previously, if a driver went into the final 10 races 10th in the standings, his championship chances were virtually nil. Now, 10th will be almost as good as first, come September.
Where previously, teams had to focus in early spring on a tiny target for autumn (first, second, maybe third place in the standings to stand a chance), they now can roar freely through summer, hurtling toward the broad side of a barn–make the top 10 and you’re a serious contender for the title.
The other points change, though minor, helps the incentive for winning: the doubling of the points differential, from five to 10, between first and second place in a race.
When NASCAR announced the changes in January, and the uproar came from fans and drivers alike–Kenseth foremost among them–my gut instinct was, check with them again about October; they’ll love it.
Already, check with Earnhardt’s red-clad legions: Seventh, schmeventh. No big deal. No disaster there. Should the points order on Sept. 19, when the final sprint begins, be exactly the same as now, Earnhardt and Kenseth would be bumper-to-bumper for the championship.
And who would complain about that?