Greg Biffle, driver of the No. 16 3M Ford Fusion, moved up
four spots after last week's fifth-place finish at Talladega and now
sits 10th in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series standings. Biffle spoke about
his team's recent resurgence before qualifying on Friday.
"I think the second practice we
got our car going better than we were in the first practice, but still
when we switched to qualifying trim, we couldn't get a handle on it. We
couldn't get it to go like we wanted it to, so I'm not real sure how
we're gonna end up qualifying, but I think we'll be good for tomorrow
night."
WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT TALLADEGA? ANY SUGGESTIONS? "I think
we're all glad that last Sunday nobody was seriously hurt. You think
about the fans sitting in the stands with no protection, but also Carl up
in that fence. We've seen injuries in the past with fence posts or
things coming through the windshield or side window coming inside the
car, so, first of all, I'm just thankful that nobody got hurt.
Secondly, we continue to push the envelope as drivers about bump drafting
and about pushing each other. We always talk about it. NASCAR always
talks about it in the driver's meeting. We don't want you bump
drafting in the tri-oval, so we start pushing on the straightaways and
then we start pushing real lightly in the corner, and then we start
pushing a little bit harder and, ultimately, that's what ends up causing
an accident. And blocking. We've seen it over and over again, when you
block somebody or pull down, NASCAR said they'll penalize us for going
below the yellow line, so you have to do a good job about knowing whether
you're clear or not in order to move down in front of a car because that
car is no longer gonna move below the yellow line because they don't
want to be penalized. One, we need to police the bump-drafting a little
bit more and say, 'If it's physically making contact with the car
around the corners,' maybe you should be penalized possibly. And then
the other thing is they always say if you force a guy below the yellow
line you may be penalized. If you pass below the yellow line, you will
be penalized. We need to probably change that verbiage a little bit to
where the 'will' is in both of them. If you force a guy below the
yellow line, he's inside of you and you just turn to the left and run
him down onto the flat, then you get penalized for that. That's not
gonna fix all the problems.
"Restrictor plate racing is a great thing and
we're always gonna be bunched up, we're always gonna do that, but there
has to start being some consequences for the bump-drafting and chopping a
guy off when he's inside of you. Last year, a perfect example, a year
ago the guy elected to go below the yellow line and not turn Tony Stewart
around and flip him upside-down, and they took the race away from for
passing below the yellow line. This year, the guy knew not to go below
the yellow line and we had an accident. Both cases were trying to block
or force that guy below the yellow line, and maybe we're gonna have to
be harder on that guy for trying to force a guy down there."
KURT BUSCH
SAID AT PENSKE THEY HAVE AS MANY TRACK SPECIFIC CARS WITH THE COT AS WITH
THE OLD CAR. IS THAT TRUE FOR YOU GUYS AS WELL? "No, it's not. I was
listening to him, maybe that's why they're running better this year.
He's right up there, but, no, we're not. We don't have as many track
specific cars. We do have some short track cars that are a little bit
lighter that we'll try and get as light as we can, and certainly have
speedway specific cars and then you have road course cars. You're
always gonna have that, no matter what we race, but we don't have as
many cars as we did have. This car allows us to go more places with the
same car."
CAN YOU TALK ABOUT YOUR DRAG RACE LAST WEEKEND? "I've got
a 2007 Shelby GT500 Mustang and it's a secret what's under the hood.
It's a stock Ford engine that I just changed the super-charger on it.
It comes factory super-charged and I've changed the super-charger and
put an exhaust on it. I've got a computer guy that works on all my cars
with the computer deal, but, other than that, I've never taken a valve
cover off it. It's pretty amazing that a street car or a car from the
factory will run 10.00-flat quarter mile close to 150 miles an hour.
It's a pretty amazing car. I drive it to the race shop. It's got a
navigational screen. I can shut the air-conditioning off and race the
guy next to me. It's full wheel-tubbed, trans-brake. He's got it on
the trans-brake on the rev-chip leaving the line and all that. It makes
probably low 800's with the rear tires. It's a pretty cool car."
-credit: ford racing
