Matt Kenseth eyeing top seed for upcoming Chase - MotorSportsTalk

With a series-high five wins on the season, Matt Kenseth could be heading into this year’s Chase for the Sprint Cup as the top seed in the 12-driver field.

And after his latest victory last weekend at Bristol, the Joe Gibbs Racing driver feels his No. 20 team is firing on all cylinders as NASCAR’s post-season looms.

I feel pretty confident right now,” said Kenseth on Friday at Atlanta Motor Speedway, where he’ll start sixth in Sunday’s Advocare 500. “I feel like we have a really good race team. Right now, we’re really on top of our game on pit road and with car prep and the rest of the stuff.

“I feel good about all that, but you have to perform each and every week once you get [into the Chase]. The wins are great – obviously, as long as we make the top- 10, that seeds us up toward the top. We should be at least a tie or hopefully ahead. That is good. You have to put together 10 strong, solid weeks for sure.”

Atlanta could yield a sixth win in 2013 for Kenseth, as the 1.5-mile oval has been a historically strong track for JGR. The team has earned 10 Sprint Cup wins at Atlanta, including the most recent race there last year with Denny Hamlin doing the honors.

Kenseth has admitted in the past that he felt some nervousness about joining JGR over this past off-season, and did so again on Friday. But despite some humbling moments at the beginning, he’s managed to settle in comfortably.

“I had a little bit of anxiety, especially when the secretary didn’t know who I was or what I wanted there,” he recalled. “You always have moments like that to kind of get used to it and it always humbles you. Certainly, I felt really at home there from the beginning, at least after that first 15 minutes until she realized what I was there for.

“Since then, I’ve really felt at home there and it’s a special team. We all get along really good. We work together really good. I think we understand each other, have the same goals and ideas and stuff. It’s been a lot of fun.”

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An IndyCar executive said there is “absolutely” disappointment that its long-awaited video game recently was delayed beyond its target date, but the series remains optimistic about the new title.

“Well, I don’t know how quick it will be, but the whole situation is important to us,” Penske Entertainment president and CEO Mark Miles said during a news conference Monday morning to announce IndyCar’s NTT title sponsorship. “Motorsport Games has spent a lot of money, a lot of effort to create an IndyCar title. What we’ve seen of that effort, which is not completely obvious, is very reassuring.

“I think it’s going to be outstanding. That’s our shared objective, that when it is released, it’s just widely accepted. A great credit both to IndyCar racing, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, something that our fans love.”

In June 2021, IndyCar announced a new partnership with Motorsport Games to create and distribute an IndyCar video game for the PC and Xbox and PlayStation consoles in 2023.

But during an earnings call last week, Motorsport Games said the IndyCar game had been delayed to 2024 to ensure high quality.

Somewhat compounding the delay is that IndyCar’s license for iRacing expired after the end of the 2022 season because of its exclusive agreement with Motorsport Games.

That’s resulted in significant changes for IndyCar on iRacing, which had provided a high-profile way for the series to stay visible during its 2020 shutdown from the pandemic. (Players still can race an unbranded car but don’t race on current IndyCar tracks, nor can they stream).

That’s helped ratchet up the attention on having a video game outlet for IndyCar.

“I wish we had an IndyCar title 10 years ago,” said Miles, who has been working with the organization since 2013. “We’ve been close, but we’ve had these I think speed bumps.”

IndyCar is hopeful the Motorsports Game edition will be ready at the start of 2024. Miles hinted that beta versions could be unveiled to reporters ahead of the time “to begin to show the progress in a narrow way to make sure we’ve got it right, to test the progress so that we’re ready when they’re ready.”

It’s been nearly 18 years since the release of the most recent IndyCar video game for console or PC.

“(We) better get it right,” Miles said. “It’s something we’re very close to and continue to think about what it is to make sure we get it over the line in due course.”