Kenseth vs. Gordon
Matt Kenseth's week isn't going well at all. After getting spun out at Chicagoland by Jeff Gordon, and getting knocked from first to 21st, Kenseth got hit by a student driver will going from the airport in Indianapolis to the motor speedway for Monday's test session.
Kenseth said at first he thought it was Greg Biffle, who apparently has a reputation of tapping cars at airports, but it turned out to be a student driver and an instructor.
After Kenseth got that mess straightened out, he went to the speedway. He said he didn't like the first car he tested. Then took out a second car and almost immediately crashed that one.
To end his day, Kenseth got to field questions from the media about his run-in with Gordon at the Chicagoland race.
Doesn't sound like a very fun two days.
Mark Martin said he didn't think Jeff Gordon intentionally spun out Kenseth at Chicagoland, but he did intend to hit him. Kenseth wasn't exactly in agreement with Martin's assessment of the incident.
"I think Mark was being nice. I mean, I think that anybody honestly that's watched more than two or three races in their lives and watches replay knows that he meant to spin you out. I mean, my car was pushing so bad, you had to hit it pretty hard to spin it out. The weird thing is he would have passed me the next lap anyway. He was catching me so fast. You can clearly see, we got in the corner, we both got on the gas, he just picked up on the gas, kind of like earlier, and drove me over. I think it was intentional, but doesn't really matter what I think."
On one hand, it's encouraging to see Gordon get a little aggressive and start winning races again. On the other, Gordon cost Kenseth at least a top-five finish. Even Kenseth admits he didn't have the car to win the race and that Gordon was able to pass him as the race winded down. About the only thing that would have prevented Gordon from winning the race was a yellow-checkered finish.
This little skirmish is far from over. Look out New Hampshire.
About Haddock
in the Paddock
Tim Haddock covers motorsports — including stock-car and open-wheel racing — for the Los Angeles Daily News.
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