Matt Kenseth spins across the parking lot of the Country Inn & Suites aboard his Cannondale Synapse Hi-Mod Black Inc, fiddling with a heart rate monitor tucked under a teal-blue jersey. Only the most diehard stock car-racing fans would recognize him as one of the winningest NASCAR drivers of the decade.

The air thickens with spray sunscreen as Kenseth and his friends—racers Jimmie Johnson, Josh Wise, and mechanics—chatter onto the adjacent highway in a diamond-shaped peloton. He claims the lane with eager, uneven pedal strokes, bantering breezily about everything—everything except cars.

Hannah Weinberger

“We’ve been racing for so many years that when we get away and we go out and ride, it's kind of a release,” says Kenseth, a NASCAR fixture for 19 years. “The last thing you're really feeling like talking about is racing.”

Since picking up his first real bike in 2014 for exercise, Kenseth has not only gotten hooked on all things componentry and KOM, but made cycling a priority (first mountain, then road), developing NASCAR friendships along the way that give him an outlet from the stresses of the track.

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The ride pace quickly cracks as the road lifts into country hills, and the group strings out. Grimaces temper laughter, but Kenseth grinds his brick-sharp calves to push skyward, tense-shouldered and determined to hang on to the back of the pack. His heels stay high through the stroke where more polished riders like Johnson drop them for maximum efficiency; Johnson, elbows lowered and back purposefully curved, sticks by his side.

What Kenseth doesn’t do, though, is take risks. He’s signaling turns, staying out of the drops, and hugging the shoulder because he believes it safer.

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It's a cautionary approach markedly different from the way he races: confidently making split-second decisions that factor in race position, the condition of his car, how much gas he has left, and even how much he’s had to drink inside a cockpit as stifling as any boiler room. Yet for all his self-possession, Kenseth's crash rate was the 15th highest in the elite Sprint Cup Series last year, and lapses in judgment—like purposefully wrecking a race leader out of championship standings in the wake of perceived disrespect—resulted in an infamous two-race ban and two-month probation.

But now, he's out riding 50 miles with 5,100 feet of elevation gain, for fun, the day before a race, in part because of his hazardous career. A desire to stay at the top of the elite Sprint Cup leaderboard leaves Kenseth, 44—the sport’s third-oldest full-time racer—in constant pursuit of new ways to keep his mental and physical edge, and cycling’s the method that stuck.

Bicycling spoke with Kenseth, currently fifth in the Sprint Cup series, about his newfound passion and the unexpected ways in which it’s added to his life.

BICYCLING: You’re out here riding the day before race; is it something that most of your crew understands? Like, that this is important to you?

Matt Kenseth: There’s a few. I used to watch Jimmie [Johnson] go do that and see how hard he worked before a race, and I'd be like, Man, I don't think that's a great idea. But… I'll try to use common sense the day before and not overdo it depending on what the track is, what the weather’s going to be.

How does someone who lives for driving triple-digit speeds get into cycling?

I started mountain biking a few years ago with my crew chief, Jason [Ratcliff]. A lot of the guys at Joe Gibbs Racing [Kenseth's team] like to ride mountain bikes, and Jimmie has a group; we started riding MTB Tuesday afternoons after our team meetings.

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You’ve said you ride for exercise. Why cycling, and not running or lifting weights or yoga?

There's not many things worse for me than standing inside of the gym and running on a treadmill or riding a stationary bike. Cycling is more fun. And I get to see a lot of different parts of the country I wouldn’t otherwise. And I’ve got a lot of friends and people I know ride as well so, it turned into a little bit of a social event, too. Instead of going to the gym by yourself, you get to see some friends, you get to meet and ride with a lot of cool people.

The whole crew pitches in to get Kenseth rolling again after he dropped a chain:

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Riding is racing, right? Are you competitive on your rides?

Of the people I race against, Jimmie [Johnson] is probably the one I ride with the most time, and we've always gotten along really well. Where some people don't care if you’re behind them or not—because they're fast and they don't wanna ride with you—Jimmie's the guy who'll ride with you all the time and if he's in one of his days where he's really fast and you’re in one of your days where you don't feel so good, he'll typically stop somewhere and wait.

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At 44, you’re the third-oldest driver in NASCAR—is your age slowing you down?

Certainly you can’t stop the clock, and I think that also has been some of the motivation about me exercising more often and harder than I ever have before. As the number gets bigger, you certainly spend a little more time thinking about it and certainly, you know, fighting it.

Kenseth prepares for qualifying rounds before the Axalta 400 at Pocono Raceway. Hannah Weinberger

But does fitness help you in the driver's seat?

It doesn’t matter to a racecar driver how fast you can run the 40 or how high you can jump. For racing it’s much more of a mental game. We spend more time picking out points and trying to be precise than just focusing on strength or something similar.

I think all kind of fitness keeps you mentally sharp at the end of a race, when it’s 135 degrees in the car, you’re in there a long time; you lose a lot of fluids. I feel like the better shape you’re in physically, the less distracted you are with your surroundings. You’re focused on the job you have to do rather than things around you that you can’t necessarily control.

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The stakes are pretty high, too.

It depends. It certainly can be the difference between winning or losing if you’re in a close battle for the win. If you make a mental mistake or you miss your mark or your line, it’s the difference between getting passed.

You’re unshakeable on the track, but does anything about cycling make you anxious?

The only thing that ever gives me pause is traffic, especially around our house [in Charlotte]. The roads are narrow and you’ve got to pick the right time of day to ride... most people are extremely courteous, but there's other people that just have no patience whether there's other cars or not, and won't give you much room and'll crowd you pretty good. If there's anything stressful about it, that's certainly it.

Tire Specialist Jamie Hannah Weinberger

You ride both road and mountain. Got a preference?

This may be a little unorthodox, but mountain biking can be great for training: I feel I can get a very good physical workout, but I also have to be mentally sharp all the time. When you’re really tired you still have to stay heavily focused on the trail, or you’re gonna go over the bars. I think that in a way helps me.

So, I'll get myself as tired as I can get, and you still have to concentrate on all of the downhill stuff, all of the technical stuff, to not fall off your bike—which is somewhat similar to what we do in a race.

Are there other parallels between cycling and driving a race car?

Riding a mountain bike is about always challenging yourself to do something better or faster, to get in better shape—so it's kinda like what we normally do. I've always liked anything with engines; even though I'm the engine on the bike, I've always liked driving or riding or controlling things. I've always liked vehicles.

And I guess the competition of it, especially with road cycling. You'll ride with guys, especially on longer rides, where you'll see 'em kinda just hanging in the middle of the pack and you don't realize it but they're resting, and then they'll just take off and pass everybody. And obviously with the draft and everything, it means so much on your bike. Everybody is competitive and they're always trying to go faster and be stronger and beatin' all their buddies back.

Hannah Weinberger

Do you race bikes much?

I did a beginner mountain-bike race last year and it was fun—it almost killed me, but it was fun. They have a summer series in Charlotte; I might do another couple more of them this year.

Jimmie told me that on your first ride out with his crew, you struggled, and he didn’t see you for a few weeks—but then you came back and were right there with them. What got you to go back?

When things don’t go well, I can’t wait to go back and try to get better. One ride we did, I fell over in this rock garden and cut my knee, and I was way behind those guys. I remember going back the next day because I couldn’t wait to ride over that rock garden without falling, and I did it and felt like I accomplished something. So it’s fun because it’s physical training, but you’re also getting better at something. I’ve always been very competitive, no matter what I’m doing—whether it’s a board game or racing or riding snowmobiles.

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