Kasey Kahne confident his team is "moving in the right direction"

The recent improvement at Hendrick Motorsports has most notably been illustrated by six-time champion Jimmie Johnson’s return to dominant form. Johnson won Sunday’s rain-delayed Bank of America 500 at Charlotte Motor Speedway to guarantee a spot in the Round of Eight.

Kahne, however, failed to make the 16-driver Chase field, but after suffering through what he describes as a “very frustrating season,” he’s been one of the top performers since the Chase began at Chicagoland.

I’d love to get a win and I think we can do it at Kansas

Kasey Kahne

What could have been for Kasey Kahne

Through the first four races of the Chase, Kahne has scored the sixth-most points of any driver (133). The only drivers to earn more are Martin Truex Jr., Kyle Busch, Matt Kenseth, Brad Keselowski and Johnson, all of whom are still in title contention.

“I think the cars and the organization – we’ve made huge gains,” Kahne told Motorsport.com. “It’s taken tons of work and working in the right areas. It’s taken a lot of people putting their heads together and that helped the No. 5 team for sure.

“Some of our success also comes from within ourselves and doing a better job working together. And that’s what we’re still working on until the end of the year.”

The boss notices 

While Johnson visited Victory Lane on Sunday, team owner Rick Hendrick stopped by first to congratulate Kahne on his season’s best third-place finish.

Hendrick said Kahne’s team was already struggling when the organization as a whole suffered a downturn over the summer months.

“Sometimes you just lose confidence and you want to start changing things,” Hendrick said. “They have kind of gritted it out and now he seems more comfortable. He doesn’t feel as much pressure and the cars are better – all of our cars are better.

“I wanted to tell him congratulations (after the race) because he’s been on quite a run. He’s had some rotten luck in the past. We’re building on the future and he’s still contributing.”

Trying to remove the goose egg from the win column

Kahne still has not led a lap this season, but his recent run of five top-10 finishes in the last six races gives him confidence he could still register a win before the end of the year.

“We definitely have more speed each week, and that’s what it’s going to take,” Kahne said. “I’d love to get a win and I think we can do it at Kansas. That’s a great track for us.

“The season’s been tough, a lot of frustration at times, just trying to figure out how to get better. We’re the only ones who can fix it. We just need to understand why we’re better and carry that with us into next year.”

Kahne has struggled to find consistency the last two seasons and his most recent Cup victory came in 2014. The difficulty has prompted numerous rumors of his job security at HMS.

Kahne remains undeterred.

“We are definitely moving in the right direction. We just need to make sure it carries over into 2017,” he said. “We need to make the Chase again and put together a full season like how we are running now.”

Points scored so far during the Chase