Biffle's Third Place Finish Highlights Ford Brickyard Effort

CARL EDWARDS, No. 99 UPS Ford Fusion (Finished 29^th) –  YOU HAD SOME MOTOR PROBLEMS, WHAT DID THEY FIGURE OUT? “They haven’t told me anything yet. We think it is some issue with the ECU. We changed that along with the spark plugs and the engine started running better. The biggest thing is what we were talking about there which is our strategy now. I don’t think we are points racing anymore. I think we are officially racing only for wins. We were going over what happened while it was fresh in our mind to determine the best strategy. We had one thing, we had a very fast race car. Greg finished third with his car and I felt like ours was as good as his 3M Fusion. Right now we are going to talk to the guys. Chad and I want to make sure they know that we do not quit. We keep going. We don’t give up. We put our best effort out there and if it is meant to be, it will be.”

WHAT IS THE STRATEGY GOING FORWARD? “I think it will involve lots of pushing on the right pedal and turning left and going as fast as possible. We have to take chances. We have to go race. We can do that, we can race like that. It will actually be a big relief in a way because there is no other choice. We just go race for wins. I wouldn’t bet against us. We can do it.”

THE DECISION TO STAY OUT OR COME IN, IT SOUNDED ON THE RADIO LIKE THAT WAS A TOUGH DECISION. “Yeah well Chad got thrust into about the most terrible predicament a crew chief can be in. We didn’t know what was wrong with the engine and we were kind of points racing but also racing for the win. We had a fast race car and we came in and did the best diagnosis we could and went two laps down under green. Then we stayed out there with seven cylinders or so and it ran pretty well and then got caught up on pit road again by about 50 feet when we got beat by the pace car and went another lap down and that was pretty much the death nail for the whole thing. We talked about it a little bit and the silver lining is this kind of makes it official that we just go race for wins now for the next six races. I don’t think there is much of a chance we are going to march back up there in the points.”

WHAT MAKES IT A SILVER LINING? “Well, for instance, today the decision whether or not to come work on the car, if we aren’t worried about points you just stay out and run it. You don’t know when there is a problem if there is a valve that will tear up a mechanical part of the engine or if it is just an electronic thing, which in this case it was. Hindsight being 20-20 we could have stayed out and run, stayed on the lead lap, come in and chance the ECU and then go back and race for the win. When you are points racing you can’t take that chance. We will just go race now.”

SO EARLY IN THE RACE TO HAVE IT TAKEN AWAY. “yeah, I thought we had a great race car and there is nothing you can do about this sort of thing. It is one of those things that just happens. Unfortunately a lot of those things have been happening to us. We will just go racing and see what happens after this.”

HOW DO YOU HANDLE THE DISSAPPOINTMENT OF THAT? “I try to keep things in perspective. At the end of the day we are just racing cars and it isn’t life or death. I am ultra competitive but I have learned to be the best I can on the race track I can’t let something like this affect me past today. I have to go out there and make sure it doesn’t affect the guys next week or me and we have to give the same effort every week. If there is a win there or a good run we will get it but we can’t beat ourselves.”

IS IT LIBERATING? DO YOU FEEL LESS PRESSURE TO JUST BE ABLE TO GO RUN FOR WINS? IS IT EASIER? “Nothing is easier, it is just simpler. It makes decisions simpler. For instance, if the same thing were to happen next week at Pocono, it is an easy decision. I would stay out and run it, no matter how sick the engine is, until we get a caution and then go work on it. We just have to do what we can. We have to plan to win these races. I don’t think we can think about points anymore. I don’t know what the spread is but it can’t be good. That is what I am saying when I say it is simpler. We just have to go race for wins now.”

MATT KENSETH, No. 17 Fifth Third Ford Fusion (Finished 35^th) – “I kept getting on the outside of the restarts and it seemed like I couldn’t do anything right there. We got behind on our last stop. We could stay up in the top-10 most of the day but we didn’t have a better car than that. If you put us seventh or eight we could run there and if you put us 15^th we would run there unfortunately. We got back there and some guys were driving pretty crazy. I guess at the very end of it the 21 and 78 were mad at each other and running into each other and then the 20 was trying to pass the 21 and just lost control of his car.”

HOW DID YOU THINK THE QUALITY OF RACING WAS TODAY? “I don’t know. This place is always difficult and always about track position. It was really hard to pass. I don’t know. I only saw where I was all day, I couldn’t see the rest of the track.” 

FRUSTRATING TO GET CAUGHT UP IN SOMETHING LIKE THAT WHEN YOU ARE LEADING THE POINTS? “Yeah, it is frustrating. I got hung out on the restart which is one thing. I was trying to get through there and the 14 wiped the whole side off my car in the straightaway for no reason and that kind of made me mad. I was in front of the 9 and saw he had a run so I went down to block and he went across the grass and shot me up out of the groove there. It is crazy there at the end. You could see the wreck happening and I was just hoping I wasn’t going to be in it.

ARIC ALMIROLA, No. 43 Eckrich Ford Fusion (Finished 19^th) – “That was better than the last few weeks. We have to keep working on getting our car to turn and do the things we need it to do. We have a test day tomorrow at Michigan and for my frist time here at Indy I would say I learned a lot and I feel like we made some mistakes that we can capitalize on and make better when we come back with more experience.”

TREVOR BAYNE, No. 21 Motorcraft/Quick Lane Ford Fusion (Finished 17^th) – “We didn’t finish as good as our car was or as good as we ran. We passed four or five cars and caution would come out and we would pit and lose four or five spots. It seemed like every gain we made we lost back on pit road and that isn’t usual. Our guys do a great job and they did it yesterday in the Nationwide. Something was just off a bit today and it cost us. I think we had a top-10 or 11 car but it is so hard to pass here that even with that the only one I saw that could run up through like that was Junior and he was just wicked fast. For us we just needed to be a little more free to get through traffic at the end. We ended 17^th which isn’t a bad day at Indy because it is a tough place but we could have run better.”

GREG BIFFLE POST RACE PRESS CONFERENCE (3^rd Place Finish)

WALK US THROUGH YOUR DAY AND YOUR WEEK HERE. “Well, it was a pretty good day for us.  We were just super loose all day long, and we had a pretty short practice session for us. It was pretty compact.  Toward the end of practice, we put a different package on our car that seemed like it had pretty good speed on the lap tracker but was a little bit free, and we thought that might be good for today if it was going to need the car to turn.  We decided to race that package, and just were really loose all day.  It made it difficult after about four or five laps my car just started to get real loose.  We did two tires there at the end, and I thought a lot of people would do two tires, and it turned out most everybody did four.  That hurt us a little bit, but still, we ended up third.  It kind of flattened off. That caution right there probably helped us, probably helped the tires equalize, and when we fired off there again we were able to maintain. We'll go back to the drawing board on what we got.  We've got to test tomorrow and then Pocono and Michigan, and we'll keep working on it.”

WHEN YOU'RE GOING AROUND ON THE LAST LONG YELLOW, DO YOU SIT IN THERE AND PLOT IN YOUR MIND HOW CAN WE GET AROUND THIS GUY THAT'S LEADING AND THEN HE TAKES OFF?  DOES IT BOTHER YOU OR WHAT? “It didn't really matter if you were in front of him or not, he was going to pass you in about four or five laps anyway.  His car was just really, really good.  Sometimes you don't want the guy behind you, if inevitably he's going to pass you no matter what.  Sometimes it's not an advantage to be in front of him to be honest with you, because it puts you in a position for more guys to be battling with you than the one. But he ran me down in two laps from 25 car lengths.  I don't know about Kyle.  He was a little better, but still looked like Jimmie was pretty fast.”  

-30-