Kenseth returns to site of last win, minus the Chase

FONTANA, Calif. -- Matt Kenseth missed the Chase for the Sprint Cup for the first time in its six-year history, which leaves him in an unfamiliar position coming back to the scene of his last Cup win.

But don't think there's any pity parties or feeling sorry for themselves in the No. 17 Ford camp. For when the field takes the green flag for Sunday's Pepsi 500 at Auto Club Speedway, Kenseth's mind-set will be right where it is at the start of every race.

At the Track

Matt Kenseth and crew chief Drew Blickensderfer recap their February victory and provide tips for Fontana success.

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"For me, honestly, the goal when you show up at the race track is same every week," Kenseth said. "No matter where we are in points, no matter how we're running, the goal is to do the best job you can.

"The first goal is to win. Obviously, there's only one winner and 42 losers, so if you're one of the 42, you try to do the best you can to get the best finish you can get, try to have the best run you can run, and learn as much as you can for the next time you come here."

Even though Kenseth suffered through a summer of misfortune, the team hasn't been turned into Roush Fenway Racing's research and development program.

"Nothing's really changed," Kenseth said. "We don't have any big experimental packages we're trying to test for next year. We're just trying to get some momentum, get some good finishes and get back to being consistent, and get ready for next year. But there's still seven races this year and every Cup race is a huge race and you want to run good every week."

From a driver's perspective, Kenseth said 20-20 hindsight is fine when used to evaluate your performance, but sitting and pondering the "what ifs" is counterproductive.

"You can win the race and look back and find things you could have done better, things you did wrong or mistakes you made," Kenseth said. "You need to look at that, to learn from those mistakes and get better the next time you get back. But after Monday or Tuesday, after you go through everything, all your notes and try to analyze what went right and what went wrong, what we could do better, what we did good, all that stuff -- after all that, you just need to put it out of your head. Because there's really nothing we can do about anything that happened five weeks ago where we lost points, or 10 weeks ago or what have you. You just have to do the best you can every week and keep trying to get better."

Kenseth's qualifying lap of 181.137 mph placed him 17th on the grid for Sunday's race. Now the team will use Saturday's two practices to work on making the car more drivable on longer runs.

"It didn't drive very good," Kenseth said. "I guess it would be middle of the road for time-wise. I was kind of disappointed with really how our car drove all day but our speed has been reasonable."

"We brought the same car we had here in the spring, but with totally different theories in setups. It seems like the speed's a little better but it hasn't been driving good [Friday], so we've got some more work to do [Saturday]."