BIFFLE MAINTAINS HOT STREAK WITH FIFTH WIN IN '05
· Greg Biffle won for the fifth time this season with today's triumph at Michigan and for the sixth time in the last 16 races dating back to last season.
· Biffle now owns eight NNC wins (Daytona, Michigan twice, Homestead-Miami, California, Texas, Darlington, Dover).
· Today's win was the eighth of the season for Ford, which is two more than second-place Chevrolet (Greg Biffle at California, Texas, Darlington, Dover and Michigan; Carl Edwards at Atlanta and Pocono; Kurt Busch at Phoenix.
· Ford has 562 all-time NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series wins.
TAURUS WINS 100TH CUP RACE
· Today's win marked the 100th all-time NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series win for Taurus (92 points races and 8 non-points events).
· Rusty Wallace led Taurus to a win in its debut race (1998 Budweiser Shootout).
· Mark Martin registered the first points win for Taurus at Las Vegas in the third race of 1998, and led a Ford sweep that included the top seven finishers and 13 of the top 14.
· Dale Jarrett leads all Ford drivers with 18 wins (including the Shootout and All-Star Challenge) while Martin is second with 15.
· Taurus has won point races at all but three NNC tracks (Chicagoland, Kansas, and Watkins Glen).
· Taurus has won its most point races at Bristol (9), and has won at least five times at 13 tracks.
MICHIGAN SUCCESS CONTINUES FOR FORD
· Ford has won the most NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series races at Michigan with 28. Chevrolet is second with 16 while Mercury is third with 12 and Dodge fourth with six.
· Ford has now won at least one NNC race at MIS in 20 of the last 22 years.
· Ford has the most poles at MIS as well with 22, compared to 18 for Chevrolet and six for Dodge.
· 11 different Ford drivers have posted 28 victories in 72 all-time series races at MIS.
· When the Mercury brand is included the win total jumps to 40.
· Ford has won five out of the last seven MIS races by four different drivers -- Matt Kenseth ('02), Dale Jarrett ('02), Kurt Busch ('03) and Greg Biffle ('04 and '05).
· The Wood Brothers won the first race at MIS when Cale Yarborough piloted a Mercury to victory in the Motor State 500 on June 15, 1969.
· Kurt Busch became the youngest driver to win a Cup race at MIS when he captured the Sirius 400 in 2003 at the age of 24 years, 10 months and 11 days.
· Three of the top four all-time winning car owners at MIS currently run Fords, including the Wood Brothers (11), Jack Roush (7), and Robert Yates (6). Harry Melling won all seven of his MIS races with Bill Elliott in a Ford from 1984-89.
THE LAST TIME...
Roush Racing had five finish Greg Biffle (1st), Mark Martin (2nd), Kurt Busch (6th), Matt Kenseth (8th) and
in the top 10 Carl Edwards (10th) on Aug. 22, 2004 @ Michigan (GFS Marketplace 400).
THE FIRST TIME...
Roush Racing had four drivers finish in the top five. The previous best was when three finished in the top five earlier this year at California (Greg Biffle, 1st; Kurt Busch, 3rd; and Carl Edwards, 5th.
MARK MARTIN - No. 6 Batman Begins Taurus (Finished 3rd) - "We were better at the end there. Pat and the guys on the Viagra team did a great job on the last adjustment and we were the strongest we had been all day. This is another great day for my fans and for the salute tour and I just want to thank Pat Tryson and everybody who has supported me over the years. I hope we can keep this going. That was awesome today." HOW BIG IS MICHIGAN FOR JACK ROUSH? "They're all important to him, but congratulations to Biffle again. He beat us like a dog out there. I tell you what, we're tickled to death to run third here and get up there and give Tony a run for it on that last lap."
CARL EDWARDS - No. 99 AAA Taurus (Finished 5th) - A GOOD WEEKEND. "Absolutely. Yeah, we wanted to win this race really badly, but, heck, a top five is awesome for us." FOUR ROUSH GUYS IN THE TOP FIVE. "I'm just glad to be part of the Roush Racing team. These cars and the drivers and crew chiefs are unbelievable. The engines, Doug Yates is doing a great job. My pit crew is awesome, too, so for me I feel lucky to be in this seat. I mean, the last three races in a Roush vehicle for me we have two wins and a fifth, so it's like living a dream here. We're having a good time. We'll go to Sonoma and that one is gonna be different, but I'm pretty pumped about going there too. We're just having fun." WHY IS ROUSH SO GOOD HERE? "I think a lot of it is communication between the teams. That's a big deal. Plus, it's the home of Ford Motor Company and Roush Racing. We put a lot of effort into this race." ANOTHER TOP FIVE. "Yeah, that was a lot of fun. That was the 100th win for Ford Taurus, so that's pretty awesome right here in Ford Motor Company's backyard. For me, this track is just a blast. It's fun to drive around. You can run all over the place - three-wide and four-wide. Congratulations to Greg Biffle. I don't know, it's just a cool day with four Roush cars in the top five. It's a beautiful day. Hanging out with all our friends and going racing that's what it's all about. We're having fun." HOW MUCH DID YOU HAVE TO TUNE YOUR CAR? "Not a lot, but I feel like that's what this series is all about. It seems like you almost have to start the race close to perfect and that's what we did today. We started real well and Bob Osborne and the guys made a couple of changes. That last run we were just too tight. I tried everything and we were just kind of going backwards. I really appreciate Tony Stewart and Matt Kenseth for those guys racing so great and clean. It's just fun. It's awesome to see Greg get another win. He is the man."
MATT KENSETH - No. 17 DeWalt/Carhartt Taurus (Finished 4th) - "Everybody has been running good, really, except for us. I've just been trying to get our stuff caught up to the 16. I've been trying to pay attention to Greg and Greg's been helping me a lot. Doug and Robbie have been working together to try to get our stuff close to theirs." NOT A BAD DAY. "Yeah, that's the best we've run in a long, long time. We need to get some good runs to build some confidence and try to figure out what we're doing a little bit better. That was definitely a step in the right direction." DID YOU LEARN SOME THINGS? "I hope so. We tested here and found some things that seemed to help us and we ran pretty close to the same setup when we came back as to what we tested and we were fairly close to Greg's setup. The main thing is we just have to keep working on the cars. I don't think it's a shocker to see Greg in victory lane. You've just got to work on the cars. We're so sensitive with aero that I think we just have to keep tuning on it and keep trying to get it better. I think we've figured out a few things, we just have to keep working on it." IT MUST FEEL GOOD. "Yeah, we haven't run up front very much this year, so it definitely feels good to get a good finish." YOUR FIRST TOP FIVE. "It's been frustrating the last six months or so, but the guys did a good job on pit road. Robbie made the right call not getting tires there at the end. It was a little bit of a gamble, but it paid off and we ran pretty competitively. I was pretty happy with our car today. It was nothing like Greg was, but Greg has kind of been in a league of his own most of the year." FOUR ROUSH GUYS IN THE TOP FIVE. "Yeah, I'm just glad I wasn't the one that didn't. That does feel good. Jack's done a great job of giving us good stuff. Doug Yates gives us just awesome engines. If we can get these things through the corner, they'll just fly down the straightaway. So we definitely have the equipment. We just have to stay with the stuff in the right direction. We have to keep working on it and, hopefully, we can get back to Victory Lane and running up front pretty soon."
ELLIOTT SADLER - No. 38 M&M's Taurus (Finished 8th) -- "It was a great day, I think, and another great points day. I had an awesome car on long runs, but I just think track position meant so much and we could never get up there to where we needed to be to contend for a win. It was a great call by Todd there at the end to stay out and try to get some of that. The car tightened up on me a little bit, but, all in all, it was a great, great day." YOU'RE SO CONSISTENT. "Yeah, we ran 10th to 15th all day long. We needed long runs. Our car was way too loose at the beginning of a run and had to let a lot of people go. We ended up running them back down, but I'm proud of my guys as far as the way the car is handling and the way the pit stops are going. I'm with a great, great race team. Have we peaked yet? No. Are we getting there? I think so. We're running good at a lot of places we didn't run good at last year, so to come here to Michigan and have a great car on a long run is a good, good feeling."
RICKY RUDD - No. 21 Rent-A-Center Taurus (Finished 33rd) - "We were really, really good. We came all the way from the back and came up to about 13th under green. Everything was going good and then we got a loose set of tires. Then we had a spark plug wire fall off and that's where we lost all of our laps. That's pretty much it."
GREG BIFFLE - No. 16 Charter/National Guard Taurus - VICTORY LANE INTERVIEW - CAN YOU BELIEVE YOU'VE WON A THIRD OF THE RACES THIS YEAR? "No, not at all. I tell you what, this 16 team and the National Guard car - these guys have worked really hard. We've got great race cars right now. I'm really focused as a driver and I just love this race track. Somebody asked me what's your favorite race track and it's Michigan. I used to live up here and all the fans up here are awesome. We're just excited to get a win for Ford in their hometown. It's the 100th win for the Ford Taurus and that's pretty exciting because we've got a new car next year. We don't know if it's gonna be the Fusion or the Five Hundred, but there are some great cars that Ford is producing right now and we can't wait to see what we're gonna race." DID YOU MAKE A LOT OF CHANGES THE FIRST HALF OF THE RACE? "I knew those guys were gonna be faster than me at the beginning of a run and that's the way I've got my car set up. It's a strategic move on our part. There are predominately long green runs here at Michigan. Now if it was typically a sprint race - 25 laps and then make a pit stop or whatever - we'd probably do a different package under it so it would run faster right off the green." WHAT ABOUT THE DECISION TO STAY OUT? "There were five or seven laps on my tires. I thought there were gonna be a couple more cautions. It's so hard to pass and it takes me about 20 laps to get going, so I said, 'The only way I'm gonna win is to be out front,' and it worked out for us."
MARK MARTIN PRESS CONFERENCE - YOU'RE SO SOLID. "Yeah, it's really awesome. I had a lucky stroke of luck at Pocono. We were running third and were gonna run no worse than third and had a flat tire and should have been about 25th, but the caution came out and I only got passed by a few cars. It was hard to feel lucky, but at the same time it did save us some points because we were in trouble with the flat tire and managed to limp around on the caution and get a seventh place. This was a great effort by Pat Tryson and the Viagra team today. The car was the very best it had been all day on that last run and the last adjustment just when you needed it. I couldn't be more pleased. It was another great day for the salute tour and my fans who have supported me all through the years. I just want to support them all." HAVE YOU EVER SEEN A TEAM AS DOMINANT AS ROUSH RIGHT NOW? "No, but you know you have to remember we're in a different era now. It's never quite been like this before either. Golly, look at Bill Elliott and what he did in '85 or whatever year it was. Look at what Darrell Waltrip did a few of those years in Junior's cars, so it's definitely and odd thing. I haven't seen anything like this from '90 on for sure." WITH AS GOOD AS YOU GUYS HAVE BEEN DO YOU EXPECT NASCAR TO PUT YOU UNDER THE MICROSCOPE? "I have seen that in the past (laughing)." BUT IT'S FIVE CARS DOING THIS. "I think the reason we're running is because we've got great engines right now and we've got great handling packages. Let me tell you, I know it's only my opinion, but I believe that, in my opinion, Roush Racing has the hottest lineup of drivers in NASCAR depth-wise. We don't have an off team period right now, and Hendrick is close to that as well. They're close. They're knocking on that door, but definitely the best lineup of people. We've got great engines and great drivers and great crew chiefs and really good handling packages." IS THERE A PACK MENTALITY THAT YOU WORK TOGETHER WITH ALL FIVE SO CLOSE? "No, we don't work together like that (laughing). We're all racing for ourselves. We wouldn't do anything that would hurt one of the other guys that wouldn't help us. You know, if you can give a guy a break and it doesn't hurt you, then you do that. But I'd do that for Jeff Burton, and I would do that for Rusty Wallace as well. I do that for my friends as well as my teammates, but, no, we don't work together really. Those opportunities aren't really there because we're racing against one another for everything as well." YOU MUST HAVE PICKED THE RIGHT SETUP. "We ran really good here last time here and so did Biffle, and we run a different setup than Biffle does a little bit, and he ran a lot of what he ran last time and we ran a lot like what we ran last time. We ran second to him last time and third to him today."
MARK MARTIN CONTINUED - ANY REASON WHY THE FORDS WERE SO GOOD TODAY BUT DIDN'T QUALIFY THAT WELL? "It's just little handling things. We don't have enough tires on an impound thing to find out for sure how they're gonna be at lap 30 or something. When we come here to any race, especially an impound race, if you're working with new setup stuff or you're a little bit outside the box, it can show up later on in the run and not show up in five or 10-lap runs in practice." YOU'RE HAPPY WITH THIRD AND TONY IS DISAPPOINTED WITH SECOND. WHY? "No, no. I never saw Tony all day, but I think he dominated, didn't he? I was under the impression that he dominated all day. Anytime you dominate all day and you don't win, you're broken hearted. I didn't dominate. I finished up better than I ran all day, so you've got to be happy with that." DID BIFFLE'S TEAM JUST NEED CONFIDENCE? "They started really coming up to speed back in August, really big-time and they've had the speed ever since and they've started being able to close the deal once they built that momentum and built that confidence. All of them were actually doing something that was kind of new to them and as they started closing the deal, they just got better and better at it. They have speed. They have big corner speed. That's serving them well." WHAT ABOUT THE LAST CAUTION? "It turned out good for us. We made a chassis adjustment and the car was the fastest it had been the whole race, so we came out. We vacated fifth place for the tires and finished third. One more lap - I had caught Tony - and was able to start trying to work on him, so that was certainly an improvement for us." IS THERE CONCERN ABOUT A DOWNTURN FOR ROUSH LATER IN THE YEAR? "Now you know we don't have control over that. We just take it when we can get it and work as hard as we can all the time no matter where you are in the cycle." BETTER TO GET A STRONG START NOW TO AVOID THAT LATER IN THE YEAR? "We don't have control over all that. I've been asked a million times about winning races, I'm just glad I won some. I didn't get to choose which ones they were (laughing), or I would have won 34 Daytona 500s, I guess. I didn't get to choose and that's kind of how this is. We're running good right now. We're reaping what we have sewed for a long time. We've been working real hard for a long time and it's showing now." YOU SEEM TO BE ENJOYING YOURSELF THIS YEAR. "I really am the happiest I can ever remember right now. I'm very happy. I'm excited about 2006. I'm at peace with what I'm doing right now and if I can keep this up, I can truly say that I'm going out at the top of my game and not just near. I used the near word when I started this season. I would like to go out near the top of my game, but if we can keep this rolling we might be able to justify calling it top." THE LAST 10 RACES ARE GOING TO BE VERY IMPORTANT FOR YOU. "Yeah, I can't say what we're gonna do. We're not looking at those now. All we're doing is trying to make this chase. It's still really, really tight. Broken parts and wrecks can destroy the opportunity for us to make the chase. We've already been in two idiotic wrecks already that have really set ups back - two or three - so we can't afford to have that happen. Actually three, otherwise we'd be real comfortable right now and I've got to miss those things if they happen in front of me. I've missed a bunch of them, but I didn't miss three of them." HOW WAS THE TIRE WEAR? "The tire wear on the borderline of excessive this weekend on the tire. They could have drove slow like me and made them last longer, but they chose not to. I was concerned about them. I am points racing. I didn't drive very hard until late in the race because in order to finish first, first you must finish." IS THIS ANOTHER EXAMPLE OF GOOD OLD FASHIONED RACING? "Thanks for reminding me. I meant to mention that when I came in here. That's good times, man. It reminds me of the old days and my car is running like the old days. It was sweet. It was sweet to go out there and let the fast cars race for it over the long haul. That's what NASCAR was built on. It may not be as exciting as a caution every five laps and restarts and all that crazy jazz, but it's definitely what this sport is built on."
MARK MARTIN CONTINUED - ANYTHING ELSE BESIDE THE CHAMPIONSHIP YOU WANT? "Yeah, I want to give this salute tour justice. I want to salute the fans, the media, the sponsors and the competitors. It's my way of giving them the respect that they've given me over the years and that's what's really important to me, and it's going well."
GREG BIFFLE PRESS CONFERENCE
DOUG RICHERT, Crew Chief - "It's unreal. You've probably heard it before, but a lot of this momentum started the second race here last year. We clicked on something and we continued on. This is the same chassis that we ran here last fall and we did the 2005 updates on it, and it continues to be a strong package. The whole thing combined is awesome right now."
JACK ROUSH, Car Owner - ROUSH RACING HAD A GREAT DAY. "It's people. This is a people game. NASCAR controls the cars, the templates, the engines, the dimensions. The aerodynamic specifications of the cars are so close that it comes down to the choices people make. The one thing that isn't regulated is how hard you work and the things you work on, and the templates that Roush Racing's management team - and I'm a very small part of that - have put on our race teams and our organization is just incredible right now. If I could patent it, I would." CAN YOU COMMENT ON HAVING FOUR TOP FIVE FINISHERS? "It means I'm gonna have kind of a rock and roll day with the 97 trying to figure out what happened to them. I'm sure it's my fault in some way and it'll come clear to me on Tuesday. No, it's like we were target shooting and you've got this really tight pattern where there's a little bit of variance from load to load, but you can get it close to the bullseye. Mark was probably at a point where he needed to stop for tires based on where he was on the race track because so many behind him would stop for tires, and the guys up front all did the right thing by staying out. Everybody, based on where the caution came, had their course pretty much laid out for them. At least the smart play was to stay out and take the track position because of how important that is, and then to come in for tires if you were five or six places back and just hope there was enough separation between the people that didn't have the tires that were up front and yourself. Greg, for instance being leader, whoever could get on top and then hold off the ones that were coming by."
GREG BIFFLE - "It's pretty special to come back here and win. Believe it or not, we've had some lows this season. We've had some highs. I mean, we've won five races, but also at the same time we had a radiator bar through the grille at Phoenix and then last week we lost the brakes. It felt like maybe we had an opportunity to win at Pocono. We were right up there in the top three, but I'm so thankful for where we're at and where our team is at to be able to win five races. I just hope that we can eliminate some of those mistakes that we've made. We've only made a couple, but we've got to try to close in some more in the points. That's what we're gonna have to do. Man, I just feel so lucky to be able to be where I'm at driving these race cars and being able to win these races. I just feel pretty special about it." HOW MUCH DID SIGNING YOUR DEAL HELP YOU CONCENTRATE? "It meant a lot to me. I tell you, we've been running good since we did it. We didn't run that good at Charlotte. I'm not gonna say we haven't run as good, but it is nice to have that out of the way. Like I said, it really wasn't an issue for me because I would never think about it, but it started to become a distraction when things started heating up. So we got that done and out of the way. We're happy about that. We're just focused on this championship."
GREG BIFFLE CONTINUED -- WAS YOUR CAR JUST THAT GOOD TO STAY OUT? "There was no doubt in my mind that we were - not a doubt in my mind after they got four tires - but there was no doubt that we had a fast enough car to beat a lot of those guys. There were some circumstances that could have came up. If everybody came in behind us, then we might have been more of a sitting duck, but lucky enough, I had roughly four or five guys stay out with us and that makes the guys with new tires have to race those guys for position. We only had seven laps on the tires, so by the time the clear the traffic, it's gonna take them four or five laps to clear the traffic, so they've run their tires harder than they had to. But a lot of times that may have been their only choice is to come in and take four tires. If they couldn't pass the guy that was in front of them before the caution came out, there's no way they're gonna pass them when it goes back green again. So they come in and get tires and try to adjust on the race car. There was no doubt in my mind that I wanted to lead. I was closing in a little bit on the 20. I told Doug I felt like I'd be able to get the 20 if he would have stayed out. He went in (to pit), and I thought about it and I just said, 'I'm gonna stay out and see what happens.'" HOW WORRIED WERE YOU ABOUT THE 20? "I was worried about the 20 because the 48 at Charlotte came in and took tires and started way back in the field and a lot of times if a guy doesn't get a good start or something, they can pass a lot of cars. When I was going into one, I could see an orange car. There aren't many on the race track, but I could see an orange car. It looked to me like he was in fourth. There wasn't a lot of cars in between him and I, so I knew that he had to have passed a group of cars - like four or five of them in one corner in the top groove or something. I thought, 'Shoot, here he comes. He's just gonna mow me down with those new tires' because he had a pretty fast car. We were relatively equal, so he needed to have to race those guys and use up some of that goodie that new tires give you in order to level the playing field once he caught me. It probably would have been a different story if we had a caution. It might have given him another stab at me, but my car was pretty decent even off of the caution, so, I don't know, I think we could have beat him probably if the caution might have come out, but it was nice to have the fastest car today."
DOUG RICHERT CONTINUED - WHAT ABOUT THE STRATEGY AT THE END? "Clean air. We talk about it all the time - the aero dependency of the clean air and the good downforce on the front when you're out there by yourself is worth a lot. We'd burn our tires up everytime we'd come out behind some of those guys. We thought there that one time that we really abused the tires and we weren't as fast until the end of the run it finally came around to us. Usually about 10 or 15 laps into the run the guys could beat us a little bit in the short haul, but from that point on we became a lot stronger."
GREG BIFFLE CONTINUED - WHAT DO YOU TALK ABOUT NOW TO GET BETTER? "Doug and I sat down and spent a lot of time together last week talking about strategizing on what races we're gonna test when the chase comes. Where our weak points are. What our best car lineup is gonna be for Indy, back to California - what cars do we want to test. We're working hard on it, and we really don't think about it. We know that we're trying to close in on the point lead and, basically, we're pretty confident we're gonna have decent runs - top 10 runs - what we have to eliminate is brake pads falling out of the caliper and losing the brakes with 50 laps to go in the race. That cost us the point lead today. Those are the kinds of things we talk about and problem-solving before it happens is what's important for us."
JACK ROUSH CONTINUED - "I think that the racing that we've got today with Brian France's new format - 26 races on the first part of the schedule and 10 races on the second - still requires the same kind of traditional conservative risk-taking from a hardware point of view and a driving point of view that it always has. It was a surprise to me that the 10 races last year did not end up being a spring race. It wound up being the same kind of endurance or same kind of conservative judgments. Know what your hardware is and don't push it to its limit. If a team were out there struggling for a sponsor, what I have to do is show some blue sky here and I don't mind finishing three times but I've got to win a race or I've got to get a pole, that would be a go-for-broke kind of strategy. The format that we operate under today is still the same that it has always been. The drivers have got to protect the car until the last 10 percent of the event or so, and then take their risks prudently. You have to be careful what they run into and slapping the wall and doing the other things. If they don't, then you won't be in the championship hunt. You won't have enough points for it." DOES THE SIZE OF ROUSH RACING HELP TO ADAPT TO THE IMPOUND RULE? "I'm surrounded by really, really smart people with one flaw - they hang around with me and I don't know why they do that. When they opened up Texas the first time, when we went to Las Vegas the first time - I don't remember Loudon or Fontana - but most of these new race tracks - when we have a tire change or spoiler change - the guy that I'm blessed with having in my company that I'm accompanied by, they adapt to it faster than their peers. They historically have done that. Carl is the latest indication of that. He's had very little experience with these cars and has moved right in and taken right over - much like Greg did and like Kurt Busch did before Carl and between Greg. We've got a culture of - and I guess Mark Martin is the initial bearer of it or the daddy of it - but we've got a culture of being pragmatic and looking at what's in front of us and thinking about the things that we need to do and that's just the way we live and the guys do very well."
GREG BIFFLE CONTINUED - HOW CAN THERE BE A REVERSAL WITH CHEVYS SO GOOD ON FRIDAY AND FORDS SO GOOD TODAY? "Because they don't know what the track is gonna do. They're not educated enough about the race track, I don't believe. And the difference between qualifying and the rookie, young guys are gonna qualify fast because that's the way they've got the race car setup. When it comes to lap 50 on in the race, they'll be fast for the first part of the race. I knew Michael Waltrip at Pocono was gonna be fast for the first portion of the race. I didn't suspect him to be there all day just because you can't lay down a lap that fast and then race all day in a different condition. It's impossible to do, it really is. Qualifying and the way our cars change aero-balance and the way they change everything - shocks, springs, there are all kinds of things that I cannot get my car to go that fast for one lap. Like in California, I qualified fifth, which is pretty good, but I knew the minute I took the tape off it that thing is gonna be gone. We knew it was gonna be fast because I was just too loose to go that fast. And the guys that aren't, aren't gonna be around after 20 laps."
JACK ROUSH CONTINUED - "In the tradition qualifying deals, there was a number of the really good teams that changed their geometry. They changed their camber. They changed their caster splits. They did a number of things to change the geometry to get that speed. In a qualifying situation you don't have to worry about if you overheat one tire, if you overheat the corner of a tire. You can go punish that car. That's where speed is for one lap, but you've got to have a four-legged dog to go fast for a fuel run. You've got to be heating all of our tires evenly. If you have additional speed by heating one tire or having a cold tire more than the others, then you've got a three-legged dog and you can't do that. I've spent enough time being a tire guy when I was trying to play car guy a few years ago. You just really have to warm the tires and have them balanced. The crew chiefs understand that and the tire guys understand it and the drivers know what they're looking for. The experienced guys know when it feels like it's gonna stay on its tires and that's generally not the fastest lap."
GREG BIFFLE CONTINUED - ARE YOU SURPRISED ABOUT THIS TEAR YOU'RE ON? "Yeah, I felt like it, but you don't ever want to say anything about it because you could have egg on your face, you know? I said a couple of weeks ago that I feel like we're gonna continue to win. I felt like we could have won last week at Pocono. I really do. I told Doug, 'I can get out front. I can get track position. We can win. I can beat Carl.' I was faster than Carl. I was beside Carl and he pinched me off two or three times. They would wave at me. We're racing hard, so I asked myself, 'Where is it gonna stop? Why would we not be able to win at all these other venues?' With what we know right now and the way we're going, I feel like we can keep winning. I started to do a little homework of my own. Everybody is asking what the biggest difference is between last year. You know, we won two of the last 10 and almost three, and I really, really like to count Kansas as a win. If you go back and replay the race, we were gone all day. Nobody could come close. We put half the field a lap down and Doug tells me on the radio, 'We'll get a caution with 15 laps to go, we can't make it.' I said, 'What?' 'We can't make it.' I come in, pit, put four tires on it and start 21st. Crossing the stripe I was catching them three-tenths a lap - Joe Nemechek and the 21 car. I needed four more laps, so, really, we won three of the last 10 so what kind of a record is that? What kind of a percentage? That's about the same that it is this year, really. So once we got to that point last year, and broke through and figured out what we needed to do, it's kind of carried over. So at the end of the season at Homestead I was really, really confident. Starting out I was excited to go to California, Atlanta, all those places. I felt we were gonna be dang good at it, and, right now, we've got it figured out what we need to do and we're gonna continue to run up front, I think, I hope. God Bless our team to be running good. Everybody can say that they would have won or the could have won or they should have won. I'd tell you straight up whether I thought I could win or not, and I felt like I had a great chance at Pocono."
JACK ROUSH CONTINUED - WHEN YOU CARS GET THIS GOOD DO YOU START TO HEAR FOOTSTEPS FROM NASCAR? "Boy, this has not been that slow a news day (laughing). You don't need to write the editorial (laughing). I think NASCAR is in a real box here, not with me but with whoever would step up. We've got so many templates and we've got so many inspectors and we've got so much electronically recorded and reported, that I don't know how you would effect or weight this outcome. I think if it's fair and it's gonna be fair. The one thing that they haven't done, we even talked about this, the one thing we've missed or that they've missed is we could limit the number of people that go to the race track, and I guess you could run some kind of a standard racing test - an SRT test or something - and limit the total IQ. You could have so many dummies or you could have twice as many real smart people (laughing). But, anyway, the thing that isn't regulated is how efficiently people work together and how much they pull together, and I'm blessed with people around me right now. They don't approve of me most days, but the approve of one another and they try to help one another. Yeah, they rub a little on the race track. I hope they don't flip each other off, but maybe they're borderline discourteous once in a while when somebody has the speed and somebody else wants the spot, but they work together. We've got the most harmonious group and I think the most efficient blend of engineer and driver and crew chief in stock car racing today, and I think that's the reason we're having success. Regardless of how the rules have changed and regardless of the templates that would come out, I think when the people sit down - as long as they don't bring some template to us or some rule to us and not give us an equal amount of time to work on it, I'm confident that our people will be as competitive as the drivers are."
JACK ROUSH CONTINUED - WHAT WOULD YOU DO WITH QUALIFYING IF YOU COULD? "What I'd like to do with qualifying is have two-day programs, where you'd test qualify and impound on one day and then race the next day. With the 36 races we've got now, and, by the way, I'm not averse to bringing a couple more into schedule. I think it could be 38, but to have a two-day event, rather than spread out over three days is great. Whether there's no testing or whether there's all the testing in the world is fair. Regardless of what they do as long as everybody can do it. The limited testing policy is good, I think, and limiting the number of days would be good, and limiting the number of people that would go to the race track per team or per driver, I think that would be OK, too."
GREG BIFFLE CONTINUED - WHAT WOULD YOU DO IF YOU COULD START FROM SCRATCH? "I really like to qualify and being able to change the car some. There are certain things that we can do to the race car to make it easier to qualify. However you want to state it, if they gave us a few more options, which means opening the hood and bringing tools and changing some stuff, but if we could change the front swaybar to qualify. If we could move the track bar to qualify, but not all the qualifying oils and wheel bearings and special this or special that. If we could do a few more things to the race car to get it where it's better so that we can qualify it, that wouldn't bother me any. Obviously, I qualified 25th today. I want to qualify better than that, but my car is so loose with the way I have it set up that I can't do that. I'm happy with the impound. Like Jack, I'm in favor of condensing the shows, but I'm not in favor of losing practice time. We need to keep the practice time. We need three hours of practice and we need to break it up to where we have more time in between the practices. Put the Busch cars on the race track during that. I thought that was a good combination and I think they're on the right track about condensing the shows. One thing I didn't understand is that we went to Dover this year for an impound race and we added a day to the schedule. The Busch cars were on the track on Thursday, so I didn't quite understand how the schedule increased by a day, instead of decrease or stay the same. But they're working the bugs out of it and I think they're on the right track."
DOUG RICHERT CONTINUED - HOW DO YOU KEEP FROM GOING CRAZY OVER THINGS LIKE BRAKE PADS FALLING OFF? "That's the main reason that we have the meeting that we have on Tuesday with Jack and the crew chiefs and the engineers of all the teams. The more people that back each other up, the less mistakes that we'll all make. We're bringing stuff to the table to back up one another so that if one person or two teams going to the track and the other three are different, we need to know why. Is it just an oversight? Like the brake package for instance. It's the same brake package that we used for both races last year, but what we still have to be aware of and realize with the gear rule - but having people back each other up. If they're going to the track one way and we're going there the other, we just missed the brake package. We didn't realize we were gonna be effected like we did with the gear rule and without shifting and less rpm to slow it down. That really killed us and in the race it bit us and really hurt us."
JACK ROUSH CONTINUED - "But coming through that, realizing that we had a problem and somebody missed it and some people didn't, then there's one more document that goes in the system where we look at things together in terms of what we're taking brakes to the race track right now. So we get an engineering sign-off that Jimmy's system is not different and more problematic, it doesn't have a great propensity to have a failure or that Mark's sort of pads doesn't. So we're gonna look over one another's shoulder a little more deliberately before we go to the race track, rather than rely on the guys that actually bolt the parts on the car to talk to one another and say, 'Hey, I've got smaller calipers than you. Do you think that's gonna make a difference?'"
GREG BIFFLE CONTINUED - ASIDE FROM DAYTONA, WERE THERE ANY RACES WHERE YOU KNEW IT WASN'T GOING TO BE YOUR DAY? "Martinsville. That's my worst race track. Martinsville and I don't get along very well. We're gonna spend a couple days together and talk coming up. Dover. We won there. I wasn't for sure that we were gonna get it decent enough to be able to win because we changed so much stuff. That was more our 2004 grocery bag and shopping cart of stuff at the car and see how it runs in the race. We went back to the Busch race to learn some stuff, and I think Dover was probably the biggest surprise to me of how I started out and then how dominant and fast I was after I got the car the way I wanted it. That was a big swing in the race, but, other than that, it's pretty much been business as usual. There are races I don't feel like I can win. I feel like I have a chance to, but I'm not saying I can win here. Richmond, I didn't feel like I could really win there, but I felt like I could run in the top five and possibly win if the situation is right." WHAT ABOUT SONOMA? "I don't know if I can win in Sonoma. I'm gonna try to be like Jeff Gordon and Boris Said and all the road racers that are gonna be there. I think I run better at the Glen than I do at Sonoma, but we were fourth in Sonoma last year and ran out of gas, so I think we're gonna be OK there." CAN YOU EMPATHIZE WITH TONY WHO WAS UPSET AT SECOND AND MARK WHO IS THRILLED WITH THIRD? "Did you hear my interview after the Atlanta race? The worst day of my life. I had an awesome car. Tony had a pretty good car. I was faster than Tony the last third of the run or better. I was catching him right there at the beginning of the run and he was gonna have a little trouble if it stayed green, but, yeah, I've been there. Man, I tell you what, I've gotten bit so many times by not making the right adjustments in the pits. I lost my track position at Atlanta. They would have never beat me if they wouldn't have beat me out of the pits, so it's frustrating. We only get 36 chances a year to win and not every race do you show up and have a race car like that. When you show up and have a race car like that and then didn't win, he's not happy. Look at how he finished the last five races, and to come here and do that and then not win, it's a pretty good letdown." WAS THIS YOUR CALIFORNIA CAR? "No. We've got that bullet back in the treasure box. This is the same car that I ran here at the end of last year and ran Kansas and Homestead with."
DOUG RICHERT CONTINUED -- ANY DOUBT ABOUT GETTING BACK AND WINNING RACES? "Sure, because it's so hard to have such a great package like we've got right now and to be part of it. It takes every piece of the puzzle to win these races and I'm just happy to be here to be part of it and the organization."
GREG BIFFLE CONTINUED - CAN YOU TALK ABOUT THE INJURY FROM LAST NIGHT AND WERE THERE ANY KEY ADJUSTMENTS THAT MADE YOU MORE COMFORTABLE TODAY? "No, it was pretty much stupidity on my part. Well, it was stupidity on the other guys' part - Tyler Walker. Unless that team has the kind of money that it takes to run a driver like that that crashes every week and is in people's way - has no respect for other drivers on the lead lap with 10 laps to go - it's guys like that who end up without a ride and don't know why. There's guys running Nextel Cup cars that are like that, that are down to their last hurrah, you know, and there's a perfect example why. They'll never do anything in our sport. There was something wrong with the suspension on the car. I had no decklid, I don't know what was wrong with it, but I spun out and hit the wall on the left side pretty hard. I hurt my foot. I hit my head pretty hard. It probably knocked me out momentarily, I suppose, and cut my wrist. But it was painful. My guts hurt today. My stomach, ribs, shoulders, head - I've got a headache, but you've got to do what you've got to do." DID YOU DO ANYTHING TO THE CAR? "No, I didn't do anything in the car. I just wasn't in a real cheerful mood. I just kind of moseyed to the car, got in. I was pretty upset that I made that kind of mistake. I mean, the car, there's something wrong with it. I almost wrecked twice going three-quarters speed and then I spin the thing out and put it in the wall and almost hurt myself bad. I've got to have more sense than that."
GREG BIFFLE CONTINUED - DO YOU FEEL BETTER NOW? "Yeah. Winning cures everything."
JACK ROUSH CONTINUED - TALK ABOUT HAVING FOUR TOP FIVE FINISHERS. "Today was the 100th win for the Ford Taurus, so it was great for that. It was great to win here on the 100th anniversary of the Ford Motor Company. It was great to win with Flash, the fastest man alive. That was one of the coolest cars and the coolest promotions we've ever been a part of when he pulled that off. There have been so many great successes that we've had here over the years. It's close to Roush Industries and we enjoy having all our people come out and our customers come out. We've got about 2000 employees in the area that work in support of the automobile industry and this is home. I am for MIS like most of the rest of the NASCAR community is with regard to Charlotte. Winning Charlotte is such a big deal for all the teams that live there. Well, I've still got my foot in two different regions. I like what's going on in Charlotte because I'm part of that, but I like to come up here and do well as well." IS THERE A CONCERN THINGS COULD GO BAD AT THE WRONG TIME? "From the organizations point of view I'm real confident that the organization is stable. We've had a terrible run of misfortune with Matt Kenseth's program and you saw today how it did. It's been the same program. We haven't changed a person. The crew chief hasn't changed. Matt didn't go to some drying out clinic. The only thing that happened that caused a turnaround in that program is just the stars lined up. They were lined up all snake eyes for a while and now they're moving toward a more neutral situation. So we've endured the lulls and this is obviously a high. I don't expect to go to the next handful of races and have another four out of the top five or five out of the top 10, but whenever it happens I'll be thankful for it and put it in the bank because I know that there will be bad times coming."
