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Kasey Kahne's chances of winning his first NASCAR championship might have just went up in smoke -- literally.Kahne's No. 9 Budweiser Dodge stumbled on lap 69 of Sunday's Chase for the Sprint Cup opener at New Hampshire Motor Speedway and belched smoke before the Washington driver made a hard left turn into the garage area. The engine problems came just days after reports said that his team's engine shop was in turmoil after a recent merger announcement.
The woes will leave Kahne with a 38th-place finish to start the 10-race run to the championship but not out of the fight quite yet.
As was quickly noted by ESPN after the Dodge engine in Kahne's No. 9 grenaded, Jimmie Johnson suffered a similar fate with a 39th-place finish to open the Chase in 2006. He rallied over the remaining 9 races to win the first of his three-consecutive titles.
After exiting the car, Kahne was obviously disappointed.
"It's a bad deal," said Kahne. "It was a good car. I thought we were a pretty good car [before the problems]."
Kahne's team, Richard Petty Motorsports, hastily announced before last week's race at Richmond that they would merge with Ford team Yates Racing. The team will switch to Fords in 2010. Mark McArdle, now the team's former vice president and manager of racing operations, reportedly had a heated confrontation with team co-owner George Gillett Jr. at Richmond over the planned merge.
It's expected that the RPM engine shop will close and that the Yates Racing engine shop will handle the power plant duties in 2010.
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