THREE IN A ROW. WHAT DO YOU THINK?
Matt Kenseth: “I haven’t really thought a whole bunch about it, to be honest with you. I didn’t think we would have won the first two races, so I haven’t really thought about the third. We’re just gonna take it one race at a time like we always do and just be business as usual. Hopefully we can get our car to handle good this weekend and have a shot. The pit crew has been operating at an extremely high level, and so have all the guys getting the cars to handle and run – the engine guys and everything – so I feel like we have the tools to be competitive and we’ll just try to be as competitive as we can and hopefully be somewhere in position at the end.”
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WHAT DO YOU LIKE ABOUT THIS TRACK?
Matt Kenseth: “There’s a lot of things I like about Vegas. Obviously the track is different than it was a few years back when we had all the success here, but it’s fun. It’s high-banked. It’s real fast. It’s actually got some pretty big bumps in it, which makes it challenging. It’s just a fun place to come out to this time of year and it’s a fun, competitive track.”
WHAT’S IT LIKE COMING HERE WITH TWO STRAIGHT WINS?
Matt Kenseth: “It doesn’t really feel that different. In a way, it doesn’t seem really seem real that we won the first two races, plus we’ve been really busy and had a lot going on the last two weeks, so I haven’t really had a lot of time to sit and thing about it or reflect on it. I haven’t even really got to watch the races on tape yet or anything. I just haven’t had time to be honest with you, so it doesn’t really feel as different as you might thing.”
WHAT DO YOU ATTRIBUTE THOSE TWO WINS TO?
Matt Kenseth: “Everything. It takes a combination of everything to be competitive these days and to be able to win. The pit crew has been operating at a super-high level. Obviously, the pit stops and getting the track position at both races was the huge key to the victory. Daytona was a little different than California. Obviously we had the luck of getting through that wreck and missing that, which is a big deal toward us winning as well, but everything from the car prep to the guys building the engines to the pit stops at the track, it’s just the whole thing.”
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IT LOOKED LIKE THE AIR HELD JEFF UP LAST WEEK WHEN HE WAS BEHIND YOU. DID YOU LEARN ANYTHING FROM THAT?
Matt Kenseth: “I didn’t really get to watch it a lot. A few things I really learned and our team learned in trying to take some lessons from last year, and of course everybody knows it and everybody tries to do it, but you really need to be in front and beating them out of the pits at the end was very important. If he would have beat us out, I’m not so sure that we would have won. He probably would have drove away, so it’s just really important to be in the front with these cars. They don’t have much downforce and they’re always pretty tight and when you get behind somebody it makes it a lot worse. Another thing is he needed to run the line I was running, which hurt him. If he could have run the top a little better or something like that with clean air, he maybe would have had a little better shot, but with his car being tight, I think he wanted to be on the bottom and my car had to be on the bottom, too.”
WHAT WOULD IT MEAN TO BE THE FIRST DRIVER TO WIN THE FIRST THREE RACES OF A SEASON?
Matt Kenseth: “It would be huge, obviously, to win this week, but every race is difficult to win. It took us a whole year to win a race, so everything has got to line up just right. We’re not gonna approach this any different than any other week or really even think about that. If it happened, that would be pretty wild. That would be pretty crazy and something I’ve ever really thought about, but we’re just gonna concentrate on going out business as usual and trying to perform.”
HOW MUCH OF A DIFFERENCE HAS DREW MADE?
Matt Kenseth: “He’s made a big difference. It’s only been a couple of months since he got over there, but it’s really helped a lot to move Drew into that role and give Chip so much more time to work on the cars and for Chip to be able to sort through data and work on setups and all that stuff, and not worry about a lot of other stuff. That’s been a huge difference as well. It’s helped to get our cars run and helped him to be more prepared for adjustments and stuff like that. To bring Drew in with a leadership role and to work with the guys on the pit stops and the pit crew and keeping the group together and all that has been a big deal.”
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CAN YOU DESCRIBE WHAT KIND OF MAGIC DREW HAS BROUGHT?
Matt Kenseth: “I hope it’s magic. I just hope it keeps going. It’s a combination of everything. It’s really a huge team effort. We were just lacking that guy last year. We all knew it. Chip knew it. Chip didn’t have an engineer to help him most of the year. He was trying to be the engineer and the crew chief and that was just way too much, so to let him go back and work on the cars has been as big a deal as anything. And to bring Drew in as crew chief with his leadership abilities and experience, and to be able to work side-by-side with Chip to help each other make us perform has been a big deal. I really think he’s gonna be the guy for a long time. I think he’s kind of the young version of Robbie when he got in to lead the team, so I think it’s pretty cool that he’s fit in that well. He fits in with all the guys really well and he’s been doing a great job so far, obviously.”
IS THERE MORE CONFIDENCE OVERALL?
Matt Kenseth: “It’s kind of hard to explain, but bringing Drew in there – as soon as I saw him after a week with how he and Chip got along and how he got along with the guys – even after he just started at the shop and we were preparing our cars you could tell that the morale was boosted already and it just had a better feeling. It just felt like there was more energy there and there was more enthusiasm there. Everybody was happier when they were at work and it just felt good. It just felt like that was the right move and we’ve always had a really great group of guys here, but you’ve got to have the whole thing. I just felt like that was the spark that was gonna help us be more competitive and help us work better.”
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