BROOKLYN, Mich. – Matt Kenseth thought he should have finished two spots higher, and not just because he finished third on Sunday.

Kenseth led four times for a total of 41 laps, but he gave up the lead for good on Lap 187 of the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series LifeLock 400 at Michigan International Speedway.

During a two-tire pit stop in the second half of the race, a NASCAR official stayed in front of Kenseth’s No. 17 DeWalt Ford, trapping him for a few seconds in his pit box.

“I thought we just kind of got beat on the pit deal again,” Kenseth said. “We had an official in front of our car when we did two (tires) and that cost us two spots leaving the pits, and that really hurt us.

“Then, we had a little miscue on our two-tire stop and that hurt us a little bit, too. Just didn’t quite work out. There was a lot of different strategies, and some guys could make it to the end and some couldn’t, and we were just not exactly in the right place to capitalize on it.”

Kenseth immediately told his crew chief he thought that NASCAR should put him up in the order to compensate for the official’s error.

“Well, I kind of knew they wouldn’t,” he said. “I’ve seen them before when officials made a mistake and they corrected it – I can’t remember if it was Carl (Edwards) somewhere in the Nationwide Series race where the official called something wrong and put him back, so you hope for that possibility.

“But the official just walked out and stood right in front of my car when it was time to go and it was either run him over and hurt him or wait for him to get out of the way, so I had to wait. And it wasn’t really for the lead, because that’s when Jimmie (Johnson) and the 77 (Sam Hornish Jr.) stayed out. But it would’ve put us two cars farther forward and the first car on fresh tires. At the end of the race, the way the caution fell, it might not have made a difference, but it might’ve.”

One of the TNT broadcasters joked that the next time it happens, Kenseth might put the official up on his hood.

“You’re not going to run somebody over and hurt ’em,” Kenseth said. “But he walked out there and saw all my guys were coming back, and usually when they walk out there they go all the way to the right side and look at the lug nuts, and that would’ve been fine-if he would’ve just kept walking I could’ve eased on out there and he would’ve been on the wrong side of the car, but I could’ve gotten out of there and he would’ve seen that I was on my way.

“It’s hard to fix every call. They’re all kind of balls-and-strikes calls. So it’s just part of it. I wish he would’ve been paying a little more attention there, because track position is still important.”