RICHMOND, Va. – For the second time in three weeks, Kasey Kahne found his No. 5 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet inside the top-10 when the checkered flag waived.
But, the difference between Texas Motor Speedway’s eighth place run two weeks ago and Sunday’s Toyota Owners 400 at Richmond (Va.) International Raceway was clear, Kahne didn’t just have his third top-10 finish of the year handed to him, he earned it.
And the 36-year-old earned it well.
“It was really encouraging,” said Kahne. “The performance of the team all weekend long, you know, practice, we didn’t get all of our practice in, but we got a lot of it in, then qualifying, didn’t get that. But I felt like we would have been great there, too.
“It was a strong weekend for our team. Communications side with Keith (Rodden, crew chief) and the engineers, just kind of what we worked on, the direction we went was really solid all weekend, similar to Bristol. We just finished it off today.
“We had a strong car, the Mountain Dew Chevrolet. We had a great restart there at the end to get a couple spots and get a top five. That was good. We haven’t had a lot of these in the last year, two years. So it was nice to run up front, nice to be competitive, battle with the Gibbs cars a little bit, Jimmie a lot, Kevin some.
“I could always see those guys, so it was nice to see the fastest cars in this particular race.”
With qualifying washed out on Friday afternoon, starting positions were set according to practice speeds Friday putting the No. 5 Mountain Dew Chevrolet eighth on the grid.
Kahne’s day had potential to fumble after early contact with the wall, but as the race set into a long green flag run, Kahne’s car set sail on the race track and he used a fast race car to manhandle the competition.
Hovering between eighth and fifth for much of the race, Kahne moved to fourth in the final forty laps of the day sending him to his first top-five finish since Kansas Speedway last October.
There’s no question that the No. 5 car has had flashes of speed throughout the season and when Kahne has done well in practice or qualifying – many hoped the speed would transfer over into the race.
Most of the time, his fans, team and most importantly himself have been left with a bust.
However, Sunday afternoon Kahne looked like his old-self, even at time having more speed than his prominent teammate Jimmie Johnson – but putting finishes together start to finish will put him back on the map in a positive way and no one knows that better than Kahne himself.
It’s easy to suggest that maybe the page has been turned and Kahne’s run of less than stellar finishes and indescribable bad luck has taken its course, but this is racing – where guarantees aren’t certain. But, Kahne like the direction of his No. 5 team and is eager to move forward and see what lies ahead.
“I think there’s a lot of things that create good communication,” added Kahne. “It’s not just talking face to face. I think a lot of things go into that. It started weeks ago. I think the closer you get as a group, the closer you get with your crew chief, your engineers, the guys on pit road, the car chief, the guys building the racecar, all of that is communication to me. All of that kind of makes the whole race on Sunday better when you are better in those areas.
“That’s basically all we’ve been doing. Feel like I want every guy on my team, I want them to be on my team. I think they’re the best at what they do. I feel like we can really do a lot together. I feel like they’re really starting to feel the same about me, that I’m the driver they want, we can do a lot together as a team.
When you have each other’s backs, you work together as a team, you keep getting better. That’s where we’ve been excelling at. Mr. H (Hendrick) gives us great racecars. He has for a long time. We haven’t performed near where we should have in a lot of those weekends. It’s not the car. It’s a lot of other things. It all comes with being a strong team.”
Kahne jumped one spot in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series point standings to 14th heading to Talladega (Ala.) Superspeedway next week, a track where he started on the outside pole twice last season.
Follow Chris Knight on Twitter @Knighter01.
