Native son Kenseth earns fourth victory
Slinger - Matt Kenseth wasn't completely sure how he won the 29th Miller Lite Slinger Nationals.
Runner-up Jeremy Lepak credited Kenseth’s experience at Slinger Speedway. Third-place Dennis Prunty thought a stronger engine played a big role.
But why didn’t really matter, so much.
As the fireworks exploded over Slinger Speedway on a sticky Tuesday night, Kenseth was crowned the newest four-time champion of the prestigious late-model event.
No, it’s wasn’t quite the 2003 Winston Cup championship or even a Nationwide Series race. But yes, it still mattered to him.
“It’s different, but it’s the same,”
said Kenseth, who also won in 1994, when he was a short-track racer from Cambridge, and in 2002 and ’06, after he’d made a name in NASCAR.
“It means a lot. It’s never easy; it’s always hard. But it’s almost harder when you come back like this. It takes a little while to get in the groove and figure out the car and the adjustments."
“It’s a good thing we had a break, because we weren’t that good in the first half, and they made some adjustments that made it just right.”
Kenseth tied Nationals co-creator Dick Trickle, the late Joe Shear and five-time track champion Lowell Bennett for the all-time lead for titles in the event.
Lepak, also the runner-up-last year, finished 4.8 seconds behind, exhausted from chasing Kenseth and engaging in some of the toughest side-by-side racing of the night.
After Prunty, Sprint Cup Series point leader Kyle Busch finished fourth and Nick Schumacher rounded out the top five.
“We were junk before halfway, and we were junk after halfway,”
said Busch, whose team changed a right rear spring at the 100-lap break to keep his car from spinning out.
“It was just so loose off the corner, you couldn’t get any drive and get down the straightaway. So we got beat down the straightaway all night.”
Of the other NASCAR drivers competing, Kelly Bires was a quiet sixth and Erik Darnell, Scott Wimmer and David Stremme all dropped out in the first half.
Kenseth’s car was loose, like Busch’s, and his crew made what he called huge adjustments during the break.
Kenseth became the last of six leaders in an aggressive, push-and-shove race when he finally got around Lepak on a restart on the 138th lap. Kenseth had been trying for more than 10 laps and couldn’t pull it off after a previous yellow flag.
“That was the difference,”
Kenseth said. “If we would have been lined up with him in front of me, it would have been harder to pass."
As Lepak waged a wild side-by-side battle with David Prunty for second place, Kenseth pulled away.
“I’m just wore out, man,”
Lepak said, dripping in sweat and struggling to stay upright. “I was hoping for a little more right there, but that was all we had."
“Matt’s got more laps here than I do. That’s what it came down to. He knew how to save his stuff, and I burned mine up to stay with him.”
When David Prunty dropped out with engine trouble, his brother Dennis took third to complete a very solid run.
“B&B (Racing Engines) let me use one of their house motors, and I appreciate that. A little more and we’ll be winning,”
he said. “Those guys have a lot of motor, but this little motor runs pretty good for what I got into it.”
Among other contenders, Rich Bickle dropped out with damage from a crash, Brad Mueller parked his car after a cut tire and Bennett faded throughout the second half.
Collin Bamke, a regular at the track, escaped serious injury in a frightening, fiery accident during the last-chance race.
In a chain reaction near the front of the field, Bamke’s car rode the fourth-turn wall and was turned on its left side, pinned between the wall and another car. As leaking fuel burned, he climbed out the right window and over the fence.
Bamke was examined at Hartford Memorial Hospital after complaining of shoulder, knee and ankle injuries from his escape, the track said. He returned to watch the feature.
