MATT KENSETH, No. 20 Dollar General Toyota Camry, Joe Gibbs Racing
What is it like coming to Chicago as the defending race winner and trying to get the first Chase win this year?
“We had a strong start last year. This is a great race track, I love coming here. It’s the closest track to where I grew up. We had a strong start, but Jimmie (Johnson) still beat us at the end. I’m looking forward to getting on the track today and getting to work. It’s been a long week and ready to get started.”
What level of performance is needed in the Chase to be a champion?
“I don’t really know what to expect in the new format. I say this a lot, but there’s no magic formula to winning no matter what the format is, really. It depends on what other cars do. Last year, it would have been good enough if Jimmie (Johnson) would have ran a little bit worse because we finished second. I don’t know how it’s going to work out, I think you just take it one week at a time and get the best results you can and at the end of the day hope that they’re good enough to go to the next round and so on.”
Does your mental approach to the new Chase format change from before?
“You’re asking about my mental approach? It doesn’t really change at all, for me. For some people, maybe it does, but it’s the first race of the Chase and I’m glad to be in it. There’s never been — the reward has always been there for winning ever since I started racing, the most reward is to win and the least reward is to finish last. I don’t feel like that’s any different. I think we show up with the mindset of trying to win and if we don’t have the car to win on Sunday, we do the best we can to finish as we possibly can finish and go on to the next week and do the same thing. I don’t really think it changes. It’s the ability of your strategies maybe varying a little bit. If you’re fortunate enough to win on Sunday, you’re automatically in that second round, maybe your strategy changes as far as if you had your best car slated to go to Dover, maybe you move it back to the next round because you’re already in it. Maybe that type of thing, but other than that, I think you want to finish as high as you can every week no matter what — whether you’re in the Chase or whether you’re out or get knocked out first round or you don’t. You’re still trying to finish as high as you can for your sponsors, for your team, for your year-end point standings because it still counts towards your points. I think you just take it one race at a time, do your best every week and see where it turns out.”
What’s your take on trying to minimize mistakes?
“I think you do what comes natural, you do what you always do, try to get all you can get without getting over that edge. That’s what we do every week. The competition is tough. Besides the 16 guys in the Chase, there are good cars out there that haven’t made the Chase that are going to be out there and you’re going to have to beat as well. I just think the competition is so tough that you have to get all you can get every week. You never want to make that mistake and get in an accident or pit road (violation) or whatever the case may be, but on the other hand, I don’t feel like at least in my situation, I don’t feel like we’re fast enough to ever be conservative. If you can be conservative and you’re so fast you can win by a half a straightaway instead of a straightaway, okay but you can’t be conservative and run 16th or 17th instead of wherever you’re going to finish. You get all you can get all the time without obviously trying to make a mistake.”
Do drivers trash talk or tease to try to get to one another?
“I never knew that or ever thought of that. I don’t even know where to answer that one. I don’t think I ever talk trash. I don’t think I ever have. Teasing or having fun with people that are your friends is way different than trash talking. I don’t think I’m a trash talker at all.”
Which drivers would you want to be racing against at Homestead-Miami for the championship?
“I have no idea. I think all the cars in the Chase are good cars, good teams and good drivers or they wouldn’t be in it. Nobody knows how this is going to play out, who is going to get eliminated, who’s not, you know. I feel you have to go through the 48 (Jimmie Johnson) to win races and to try to win championships the last whatever it’s been — eight or nine years, whenever he won his first one. Obviously if something happened and they got eliminated, you’d feel like it’s a little bit more open just because they’re able to step up and when the pressure is on every year when it really counts and be able to pull through and win the championship more times than not.”
