Kenseth To Start Second After Martinsville Qualifying Gets Rained Out

 

MATT KENSETH – No. 17 Crown Royal Ford Fusion – WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT BEING SECOND? “I think that’s great (laughter). We don’t usually qualify very well here, I don’t really qualify very well anywhere but especially here, so to start second is good. The only bad thing is you have nowhere to go but backwards, but I’m happy to start second. We got all of our practice in, so it’s good.”

 

CAN YOU ADDRESS THE PAYOFF OF BEING IN THIS POSITION? “It is good to take advantage of that and this place, I’ve started in the back many times and been lapped many times, and you struggle all day trying to stay on the lead lap, so, hopefully, if you start up front and don’t make mistakes and keep the track position, it can be an advantage here to get a decent finish. We’ve had a good five weeks. The guys have done really well and we’ve finished as good or better than we’ve been running, which is always important.”

 

WHAT PIT STALL WILL YOU SELECT? “I don’t know, probably the one where that first opening is, I guess. I think there’s only one or two openings here, so you’re gonna pick where you’ve got an opening and try to get in and out of there the best you can.”

 

DID YOU SEE ANYTHING IN PRACTICE WITH TODD THAT WOULD LEAD YOU TO BELIEVE YOU’RE BETTER HERE? “I think there were a few cars that worked mostly on qualifying, so sometimes on Friday that’s hard to tell. I didn’t think we ran particularly well. We weren’t very high up the speed chart at all, but we did make some changes that made the car drive different, we found some things that it didn’t like and found some things that seemed to help it just a little bit. We’ll have to get through the next two days and see where we end up on Sunday. It seems like at this place I’m probably by far the weak link here when it comes to the team, so I’m always trying to work on it and trying to get better and give them some decent feedback so we can get the car a little better.”

 

ANY DIFFERENCE WITH THE SPOILER NOW THAT YOU HAVE A PRACTICE UNDER YOUR BELT TODAY? “I can’t tell if there’s a spoiler on it or not (joking). I can’t tell here. It’s the same as Kevin said. You can’t really tell unless you go a little faster and get racing other people. I don’t think we’ll have an aero-tight problem here.”

 

IS THERE ANY DISAPPOINTMENT YOU DIDN’T GET TO QUALIFY? “You can’t do better than first. Why would he (Harvick) want to qualify? I don’t think I was gonna have a shot at the pole either, so that’s a pretty easy answer for us (laughing).”

 

BUT AS FAR AS GETTING MORE LAPS WITH THE SPOILER, HOW CURIOUS ARE YOU ABOUT IT? “We haven’t really tested a lot, just Charlotte and Talladega, so I’m curious to not necessarily race here, but at Phoenix and Texas to see if there’s much difference.”