Five races remaining and a 267-point lead.

Is it safe to say we've reached the point in the season where we stop wondering if Matt Kenseth is going to win the Winston Cup championship and start focusing rather on when he's going to clinch it?

While Kenseth gave his fans a scare when he dropped 177 points in the two races before Saturday's event at Charlotte, it appears he's likely only three races away from wrapping things up early. And if everything goes well for the Wisconsin native, he and the No. 17 Ford should be able to lock up the title in about 2½ weeks at Phoenix.

OK class, let's stop and do the math:

There are 925 maximum points that can be won in the final five races. That includes 175 points for winning a race, plus five additional points for leading a lap and another five bonus points for the driver who leads the most laps in a race. That means a total of 185 points are available to any driver in each of the last five races.

Multiply 185 times five and you get 925 points.

At the same time, the least amount of points a driver can earn in each of the remaining five events -- assuming he is in the event -- is 34 points.

Now, here's where it gets tricky.

Subtract 34 points from 185, and that leaves you with a maximum 151-point swing between drivers in any one race, provided Kenseth and second-place driver Kevin Harvick start each of the five remaining races. Multiply that by two for the potential spread in the final two races (at Rockingham, N.C., and Miami) and you get 302 points. So as long as Kenseth doesn't miss the final two races, all he must do is leave Phoenix with a 303-point edge (one extra point to avoid a tie), and the championship is his.

But the numbers obviously change dramatically if Kenseth were to miss either or both of the season's last two races. A 371-point lead after Phoenix would clinch the title for Kenseth regardless of whether he makes a start at Rockingham or Miami. A 186-point lead heading into Miami would also seal the deal, though that number goes back down to 152 if Kenseth makes his start in the season finale.

Of course, if Kenseth goes back into the tank at Martinsville or Atlanta and has one or more poor finishes similar to the struggles he had at Talladega and Kansas, it could wind up being a brand new ballgame come Phoenix.

	Steady Matt Kenseth sits atop the Winston Cup standings.

Now that we've established what it will take for Kenseth to win the title, the next question is, how will he do it? With a clear advantage over Harvick with five races to go, Kenseth's gameplan is pretty straightforward: be conservative, stay out of trouble, worry more about overall consistency rather than winning.

What Kenseth does have to worry about is each and every driver around him, perhaps more so than at any other point this season. While most Winston Cup drivers are gentleman racers, there admittedly are a few that might take great pleasure in knocking Kenseth out of a race prematurely -- just because they can. With the championship so close yet still so far away, Kenseth will have to ignore any high-octane challenges from others and simply run the kind of race he, crew chief Robbie Reiser and team owner Jack Roush collectively map out.

Even if Harvick or some other aggressive driver intentionally baits and goads Kenseth, the best thing for Kenseth to do would be to let it go. There is no shame in backing off if the bigger prize is within reach.

One is reminded of last season's finale in Miami. Tony Stewart was on the verge of winning the championship, though Mark Martin was mathematically still in the hunt. While it would not have been surprising to see some of Stewart's fiercest rivals take a last-ditch shot at him in the final race of the year as potential payback for earlier-season incidents, the opposite happened.

Everyone, to a man, drove cleanly and respectfully of Stewart, giving him a few extra inches here or there or a bit more room to pass in the race because he had earned it for all the trials and tribulations he went through to get to that point.

One can only hope that, Harvick's remaining chances at the title notwithstanding, that other drivers allow Kenseth the chance to win the championship fairly and cleanly.

But just to make sure, keep a fresh batch of batteries handy for the calculator, just in case this points battle becomes a lot more interesting before it's finally over.

Jerry Bonkowski covers NASCAR for ESPN.com. He can be reached at Motorsportwriter@MSN.com