Sigh. Even the restarts with potential for dramatics, resulted in mostly fender benders that then resulted in tire rubs instead of all-out melees battling for position. It was Kenseth’s third New Hampshire win and the 38th of his Sprint Cup career. Where have NASCAR fans seen that before?
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The New Hampshire 301 ratcheted into high gear over the final 100 laps as the Fords and Chevys attempted to tackle the dominant Toyotas. And in a race with no Dale Earnhardt Jr.
That allowed Kenseth, Busch’s Joe Gibbs Racing teammate, to cruise to the top and snatch the lead with fellow JGR teammate Denny Hamlin with 30 laps He drove away on the final restart with 11 to go in the 301-mile race and soon the traditional lobster plopped on the hood of his Toyota. Our first run wasn’t great, we adjusted and made some great changes for run two and really I felt like we had probably the best auto all day, it just took forever to get there. “Other than that, just tried to take what it would give us and go from there”. Neither Logano nor Stewart got a sniff of Kenseth’s back bumper on the three restarts. “I had a lot of fun passing really good cars”. There’s no need to look at the rearview mirror when the vehicle is better than the rest. When you get to the playoffs you never know what’s going to happen. “I think these are all big races. This used to be one of my worst places and now I feel like it’s one of my better places”. That was pretty obvious as he led the final 31 laps.
Kenseth took the lead from Martin Truex Jr. with 44 laps to go.
“What do I have to lose here?” Kevin Harvick, 5. Greg Biffle, 6.
“We under-execute as a team on a weekly basis and got to do a better job”, Harvick said. “I mean, they are going to have to clamp down and there is no way we can win a championship like this unless they straighten some of this stuff out”.
Who Else Had a Good Day: Stewart has now finished inside the top 10 in four of his last five races.Logano scored his fifth top-five finish in his last six races…
He and first-year crew chief Mike Bugarewicz exchanged texts dealing with setup notes on Saturday night, after Stewart flew to OH to oversee the Kings Royal sprint auto race at Eldora Speedway, which he owns. “It was hard to be back there for 20 laps or so until he slipped enough to where I could get by him”.
Joey Logano took third place by.019 seconds in a drag race against Kevin Harvick. “Thanks to everybody at Joe Gibbs Racing – I’ve said it a million times, but I’m blessed with this opportunity to be over here with the guys I get to work with and my great sponsors”.
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Jamie McMurray, Ryan Newman, Kyle Busch, Denny Hamlin and Ricky Stenhouse Jr. completed the first 10 finishers.
