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Late crash costs Kenseth in Daytona Beach

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Matt Kenseth

Matt Kenseth

Wisconsin’s Matt Kenseth has lost his front-row starting spot for Sunday’s Daytona 500.  The Cambridge native got into a six-car crash on the final lap of Thursday night’s second 150-mile qualifying race.

Kenseth will have to use a backup car for Sunday’s Sprint Cup season opener, and that means he’ll start at the bottom of the 40-car field for the Great American Race, losing the number-two spot he earned in last Sunday’s pole qualifying.

Kenseth led for 23 laps and was in second for 22 more before the crash sent him, Martin Truex Junior, Jimmy Johnson and A-J Allmendinger to the infield care center.  All four escaped injury.

Paul Menard of Eau Claire finished second-to-last after his engine overheated.  He’ll start 37th on Sunday.

 

Kenseth wins qualifying race at Daytona

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Cambridge, Wisconsin native Matt Kenseth captured the first of two twin 150-mile qualifying races  at Daytona International Speedway.  Kenseth earned the third starting position in row 2 for Sunday’s Daytona 500.

Teammate Denny Hamlin won the second race, giving Joe Gibbs Racing a sweep of the evening.

It’s the second qualifying race victory for Kenseth, who also won it back in 2012.  He won the Daytona 500 that year, as well as 2009.

Crash ends Kenseth’s day

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Matt Kenseth led 86 laps of Sunday’s Daytona 500.  That’s more than any other driver in the field.  But the defending Daytona 500 Champion saw his day end on lap 149 after transmission issues.

Two laps later, teammate Kyle Busch left after blowing his engine.

Jimmy Johnson returned to the winner’s circle at Daytona for the second time.  Johnson took the lead with 6-laps to go and held off Dale Earnhardt jr., Mark Martin and Brad Keselowski for his first win at Daytona since 2006.  It’s Johnson’s 61st victory in his 400th start.  Danica Patrick started on the pole and finished 8th.

The two other Wisconsin drivers, Travis Kvapil (25th) and Paul Menard (21st) both fell victim to a last lap crash.

Kenseth makes Wisconsin proud

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The Daytona 500 was supposed to be run on Sunday.  Rain delayed the start of

Matt Kenseth

the race until the dinner hour on Monday night.  It finally finished in the early morning hours this morning and it was Cambridge, Wisconsin native Matt Kenseth that took the checkered flag.

It’s the second Daytona 500 win for Kenseth, who also won back in 2009.  He edged Dale Earnhardt Jr. to the finish line.

The race was delayed around 2-hours with about 40-laps to go when something broke on Juan Pablo Montoya’s car.  His car spun hard into a safety truck with the collision causing an instant explosion.  It took a couple of hours to clean up the mess.  Fortunately there were no injuries.