Matt Kenseth ends losing streak, wins Samsung Mobile 500 at Texas Motor Speedway – NASCAR news
Matt Kenseth finally hit the victory lane at Texas Motor Speedway after a long run of 76 races and won Saturday’s Samsung Mobile 500.
Kenseth’s long victory-less drought dates back to February 2009, when he bagged Daytona 500 and the season’s second race at Fontana, California.
The Samsung Mobile 500 win marked his second at Texas Motor Speedway and 19th in his Sprint Cup Series career. Other drivers of Roush Fenway Racing Carl Edwards was third and Greg Biffle was fourth to cross the finish line. Paul
Menard was the man to close the top five positions.
Drivers who came in afterwards were Marcos Ambrose in sixth and the pole-winner David Ragan in seventh. Ford drivers were fast enough to claim five places in top seven positions. Jimmie Johnson, Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Kurt Busch rounded off the top 10 places.
After a long time with no success, Kenseth was not sure whether he would make to victory lane and say some words for his fans.
“We had a packed house tonight, and it probably wasn't the closest finish for them, but we had great racing all night,” Kenseth said. He also said that staying right up in the front was the key to win the race, after leading for 169 out of 334 laps.
“A couple of times, when we got behind a little bit, it took awhile to get to the front. We were short on fuel [because of a fuelling issue on pit road], but because of the tire situation -- how much time you could gain on [new] tires -- we got lucky,” he
added.
He was lucky when Kenseth took his Ford in for a pit stop and the field was also heading towards the pits.
There were a total of five cautions and the last one was called out when three drivers ran wide into turn 3. Several cars were forced to spin on the backstretch of the speedway. Mark Martin and Martin Truex Jr. were involved in the violent wreckage. A.J.
Allmendinger and Jamie McMurray managed to avoid the accident.
The Green Flag ended the last caution of the race and Marcos Ambrose restarted in third place with bright chances to hit the lead. At that time, Clint Bowyer took the lead followed by Matt Kenseth, Marcos Ambrose, Carl Edwards and Kyle Busch.
Matt Kenseth passed Clint Bowyer during the 249th lap, but with a lap’s lead, he ran back into pits leaving the top spot for Clint Bowyer. His 169 led laps were 61 more in count of total laps he led last season, which gifted him
with a victory at the Texas Motor Speedway.
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