Matt Kenseth wins rain-shortened Daytona 500

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. --- Matt Kenseth, winless last year on the NASCAR Sprint Cup circuit, won in his first race of the 2009 campaign when he was declared the winner of the rain-shortened Daytona 500, with 47 laps remaining in the 51st running of NASCAR's crown jewel event.

"Just to win a race after the year we had last year, I didn't know if we were ever going to do that again," said an emotional Kenseth. "To be able to pull out the Daytona 500 is just unbelievable."

The race was red-flagged at 6:31 p.m. because of rain. Seventeen minutes later, NASCAR officials called the race at 6:48 p.m. It delivered Kenseth, the driver of the No. 17 Dewalt Ford, his first Daytona 500 triumph on the 20th anniversary of Darrell Waltrip's victory in the No. 17 Tide Chevy.

"Ah, man, it's unbelievable," said Kenseth, "I just really got to thank my team, first of all, for all the work they did. I put them in a hole, wrecking on Thursday [in the Gatorade Duel], but they gave me a killer pit stop [for four tires and fuel on Lap 120] when we needed one and it gave us the track position to be in position to win this thing."