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Welcome to the Cup Scene Daily for
Vol. III,No.VIXII FINAL EDITION
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Quote of the day:
"I think it'd be just wonderful for Greg to close out his career at Roush having won all three championships."
7 DAY ARCHIVE SundayMonday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday INSIDE TODAY'S ISSUE: NASCAR goes back and forth Andretti bid for Indy double comes up short Two cabins to open at Victory Junction camp All-star race field has gotten too big, some drivers say Stewart isn't saying Daytona 500 tickets go on sale Saturday Junior Johnson Highway connects NASCAR with its roots NASCAR denies Shell-for-Sunoco rumor Mr. Sadler's wild ride Elliott and Petty testing at Daytona this week Nemecheks' car to saulte the American solider The No. 48 is racing's dream team Top ten heading to Charlotte Shame on You, ESPN and About That Tony Stewart/Darrel Waltrip Thing Cup Scene readers speak out about Talladega
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Happy Birthday: Bud Moore, Paul Andrews, James “Spenny” Clendenen, Ross Kenseth Roush Racing president Geoff Smith met with Greg Biffle on Monday and said apologies were "given and accepted" between the two drivers. "It was just heat of the moment — nothing more," Smith said.
Team owner Jack Roush said he didn't think Busch was trying to take Biffle out, but rather "misjudged" the distance between his car's nose and Biffle's bumper. Still, Roush knows he has a mess on his hands that could soon come to rival the ongoing animosity between Richard Childress Racing teammates Kevin Harvick and Robby Gordon. After the race, Roush said he would likely wait until today to begin working things out. "I'm wrought with frustration and with sometimes anger for the things that have gone wrong, and I want to let that rest for at least 24 hours and give myself a chance to put it all in perspective from the point of the big picture," Roush said Saturday. "... I'll make every effort to have conciliatory discussions under way that will soothe the feelings and get us back on the right track before I get down there on Tuesday. But if that doesn't happen, I will make my best effort to effect an understanding that will put us all on the same page so we can come back here at the 600 and have this behind us." Roush joked that he must be "card-carrying crazy" for fielding so many teams under the same corporate banner. "To put that many people together that are competitive and very aggressive and their personal natures whose careers are developing and unfolding, to have them share space and have everybody be happy about that all the time is probably too much to ask," Roush said. But there seemed to be more to Biffle's frustration than a simple confrontation with a teammate. Biffle also took what was perceived to be a swipe at Roush on Saturday. Biffle said Busch "had more motor than I did, because he's higher in the points." The Jack Roush-Robert Yates engine-building partnership has been rushing to produce the new cylinder head NASCAR approved for Ford this year, but has been struggling to outfit all of its teams. Elliott Sadler used one May 15 at the Richmond race and finished 12th. Five more teams had them for the all-star race on Saturday in Concord, N.C., including race-winner Matt Kenseth. Roush and Yates have been distributing the heads by order of driver points. That meant Kenseth (fourth), Kurt Busch (ninth), Mark Martin (12th), Sadler (10th) and Dale Jarrett (17th) had it. Biffle, who is 21st entering Sunday's Coca-Cola 600 at Lowes Motor Speedway, did not. Kenseth didn't know which of his teammates had what. "I don't know what everybody had, but I know mine ran like Jack the Bear," Kenseth said. "That's just the way it is. "You can't build 12 engines the first week and have them all done. It takes time to get research and development done." The other question Greg Biffle seemed to be asking himself Saturday night was: Should I stay or should I go? "You've got to use some common sense. Kurt Busch took out the whole field. If I were Jack Roush, I don't know what I'd do. Either he's leaving, or I'm leaving. I'm not going to be teammates with that (expletive)." "He had more motor than I did because he's higher in (Nextel Cup) points," says Biffle of the allocation of the new Ford Racing Engines to the top campaigners at Roush. Most team owners who field multiple cars enthusiastically insist that each driver gets exactly the same equipment every week — something even the drivers involved usually don't believe. To Roush's credit, he admitted the obvious: "If we have limited parts, there is a consideration for where a particular program is with regard to points." With NASCAR's permission, Ford is developing a new cylinder head, an engine component that should allow Ford teams to make slightly more horsepower. Elliott Sadler's car tried the new component at Richmond (Va.) International Raceway two weeks ago, and five Ford cars — Sadler, Mark Martin, Matt Kenseth, Dale Jarrett and Busch — were believed to have it in Saturday's race. But Smith said that Biffle's No. 16 team has improved "light years" over last year. Biffle has been fast this year, but seems to keep getting tripped up by mechanical problems. Smith says he hopes Biffle wants to keep driving for Roush long-term. "Our view is, I think it'd be just wonderful for Greg to close out his career at Roush having won all three championships," Smith said. As for Biffle's contract, Smith said, "We'll get to talking about that some time before a year from now. We don't want it to just run out."
NASCAR goes back and forth
The defending Winston Cup champ doesn't exactly feel the need to pad his resume every time out. But given the radical changes to NASCAR's point system after last season, Kenseth and his Roush Racing Team quietly have operated this year with gas pedal-sized chips on their shoulders. After winning just one race in 2003 - the first weekend in March - on the way to the points title, Kenseth unfairly became the poster child for a system that appeared to reward consistency more than victory. "We were racing as hard as we can race last year," Kenseth said recently while he was in Richmond for the Chevy Revolution 400. "All the (Roush) teams, none of them did very good at the end of the year, and we were all a little bit behind. I thought my team did a great job of giving me competitive equipment and for us to finish as good as we did. We had ourselves in position to win a lot of races, but it just didn't turn out that way."
Unfortunately, in the ever-expanding world of NASCAR, some of those folks are the ones who write big checks and run television networks. Those hyenas want more bang for the buck and insist on creating more buzz late in the season, especially as they attempt to compete with postseason baseball and college and pro football. So, NASCAR dumped decades of tradition for a shiny, new, 10-race playoff system at the end of the year that includes the top 10 drivers and everyone else within 400 points of the leader. (NASCAR officials are quick to point out that it's not a playoff, because the remaining 10 or however-many drivers do not start out on equal footing, plus the fact that all 10 races will be full-field and everyone still competes for individual and team wins. Nice try. If it waddles like a playoff and quacks like a playoff ... ) "I'm kind of a traditionalist," Kenseth said. "I like it the way it was before. I liked that you had to race all season long for a championship and if you made a mistake in February, the mistake was just as devastating as making it in October. You collect points and every single race was equally important." Naturally, Kenseth wants to prove that he and his team are capable of winning a title by traditional means, under a playoff system, or standing on their heads, if NASCAR decides to go that route next. "This'll be exciting for the fans," he said of the playoff. "Hopefully, we're in the top 10 somewhere and we can get back evened up with the leader and have a shot at it." Results thus far indicate that he has more than a shot. Kenseth already has won more races this year (2) than last and is fourth in the points race, 126 behind the circuit's 800-pound gorilla, Dale Earnhardt, Jr. Given the new format, it's almost as important to look backward as forward. Kenseth certainly wants to be as close to the top as possible come September, but as long as he doesn't drop another 275 points to Junior, he will be there when the "Chase for the Championship" commences after the fall Richmond race. That shouldn't be too difficult for someone who has finished in the top 10 in 33 of his past 47 points races. He has not had three consecutive races out of the top 10 since Oct. 2002. "It's cool what we did last year, but that was last year," Kenseth said. "We want to get ourselves in position to try to win the championship this year under the new format and the new rules. "I'm real thankful for all the things that I accomplished, but we still have a lot of things we want to do." |
