Heated rivals Kenseth and Gordon keep their cool

	Matt Kenseth led Jeff Gordon in the Sheetrock 400 on July 9 until Gordon spun him out with four laps to go, adding fuel to their rivalry. Harry How/Getty Images
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Does anybody know what happened to aggression in NASCAR?

After Saturday's Busch race at Michigan International Speedway, didn't the fans expect the red mist in the drivers' helmets to rise on Sunday? Instead there was a textbook victorious drive by Matt Kenseth coupled with winning pit calls by his crew chief Robbie Reiser at the Nextel Cup's GFS Marketplace 400.

Certainly, steady fans were waiting to see what Jeff Gordon had in store for his rival. After two highly publicized run-ins with Kenseth, maybe we felt cheated a little when Kenseth's Ford Fusion outdistanced Gordon's Chevrolet Monte Carlo at the checkered flag.

Although these two drivers are among the most respected in the garage, the two previous incidents set up the tantalizing prospect of a vicious fight to the end. Observers with a short memory will recall only the closing laps of the Sheetrock 400 at Chicago on July 9, when Gordon used his Chevrolet to shove leader Kenseth's car out of the way en route to victory.

It may not have mattered much then, because Kenseth ran out of fuel and wouldn't have taken the checkered flag anyway. But go further back to Bristol, where Kenseth tagged Gordon from behind due to circumstances that he said were beyond his control. When Kenseth got out of his car to attempt an apology after the race, the usually well-mannered Gordon gave a him a widely televised shove that earned a rare (for Gordon) NASCAR penalty of $10,000 and probation until August 30.

Who could blame Kenseth for thinking he had a big fat target on his bumper once again? Yet that wasn't the case.

"I thought of Las Vegas, Bristol and Chicago," Kenseth said, "because I ended up losing and the guys put me in position to win. The last run, we had our car a little too tight, similar to what we were today on our last set of tires. Probably over-drove the car a little bit all three of them races, got a big lead and then faded real bad. I just tried to be a little smarter and go slower at the beginning of the run and save the front tires."

Gordon, on the other hand, thought he'd like to make amends for Chicago with an untainted win, except that he ran out of time.

"Well, I hated that I got into him [at Chicago]," Gordon said in a postrace interview. "I didn't just drive down there and intentionally spin him. As much as he might think different about that, I like racing guys clean and hard for a win, and it's always more rewarding to know that you pass a guy by racing him hard, not by just taking him out. That's the only thing that was on my mind. I would have liked to have gone up there and raced with him again and done it a little bit cleaner this time."

Oh, well. There's always next time, but all this civility isn't nearly as much fun as a good old fashioned boil-over.

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