Matt Kenseth Keeps Cool on Wild Night at Bristol

Some NASCAR fans have been yearning for all hell to break loose. At such times, a cool head comes in handy, and Matt Kenseth has always excelled at patience and smarts.

"I get out of breath just watching him go around here," said Kenseth's crew chief, Jason Ratcliff, in the media conference after the Food City 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway.

"I think that was the first nine-hour race I've ever watched," cracked owner Joe Gibbs.

Rain fell beforehand, and the race started late. It had barely started when a downpour pushed the rest of it to nearly 7 p.m. ET. It rained twice more, delaying the ending, and, of course, it rained afterward to aggravate all the dog-tired fans trying to get home.

When it rained, it poured, but when it raced, it roared.

When NASCAR visits Bristol, the battle cry has long been, "It's Bristol, baby," but it's been a while since the track hosted a vintage race, which is to say one that is stark raving mad. The one that cool customer Kenseth captured—how's that for alliteration?—featured 11 caution flags accounting for 22.9 percent of its extended distance. Only one was for debris while another was for "fluid."

Wade Payne/Associated Press/Associated Press

Kenseth is 43 years old, 12 years removed from his lone championship. In 2013, he won seven times but spent 51 races between win No. 31 on September 22, 2013, in Loudon, New Hampshire, and his fourth victory at Bristol, the 32nd of his career.

"It wears on you a little bit," Kenseth said afterward.

As 15th-place finisher Kurt Busch, who was one of at least a half dozen who, at one point or another in Bristol Motor Speedway's version of Long Day's Journey into Night, seemed to have the Food City 500 won, said on Fox Sports 1's telecast afterward, "We had a very, very eventful day. I don't even know how to describe it."

Jimmie Johnson finished second in a Chevy that had been patched more times than a cowboy's dungarees. Those who yearned for an old-fashioned Bristol slugfest went home happy. Those who had to work Monday morning got there tired, if at all.

With Jeff Gordon and Johnson bearing down on him in the green-white-checkered finish, Kenseth said in the post-race media conference, "I felt like, unless I really, really messed it up, I was going to be clear (of Gordon) going into [Turn] 1. I felt like our car was good enough to hold on for two laps.

"I felt like, no matter who was behind me, unless I made a really bad mistake, I was going to be able to hold on, the way my car drove."

On April 17, in a BMS media conference, Kenseth said, "They're all big races, and honestly, it's been so long since we've won [one] that they're all huge races for us. ... We need to get a win, and a win basically qualifies you for the Chase. ... That makes it really, really important ...

"I also believe in momentum, and you want to put your best foot forward and perform the best you can. ... I don't really feel like one is that much more important than the next."

Under the aforementioned Chase format that determines those eligible for the Sprint Cup championship, what is important is winning one.

The right driver won it. Kenseth led 47 laps after starting out front. Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Carl Edwards couldn't catch him because, by his own admission, he tried too hard...and wrecked. Busch inexplicably pitted while leading then crashed a second time, skidding into Edwards. The powerhouse Fords of Brad Keselowski and Joey Logano couldn't even make it to the first rain when they wrecked. That was at about 2 p.m. The race ended less than two hours shy of midnight.

Almost everybody who was anybody wrecked—those mentioned above, Jamie McMurray, Clint Bowyer, Kasey Kahne, Tony Stewart, Martin Truex Jr., and Danica Patrick among them—except for Kenseth and third-place finisher Gordon, another 43-year-old driver known for his smarts, not to mention four championships.

So many drivers wrecked that lots of them—Johnson, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. (fourth), Stewart (sixth), Kyle Larson (seventh) and Patrick (ninth)—worked their way back into the top 10.

It was a vintage race for the new-fangled Bristol that fans have much disparaged since it was reconfigured to provide more room to race. Apparently, it has evolved to the point that there's room to wreck again. At times, the track seemed littered with very colorful and crumpled tanks. The plot was the same as many war movies.

Denny Hamlin started the race but ran only the first 22 laps, coming down with a pain in the neck that the rain delay didn't assuage. The reliever flown in from Charlotte, North Carolina, 18-year-old Erik Jones, finished 26th in his stead. Busch's regular crew chief, Tony Gibson, spent the race in the infield hospital and then his motor coach suffering from kidney stones.

The day (and night) was even costly for those who were barely in it.

All quotes are taken from NASCAR media, team and manufacturer sources unless otherwise noted.