A Championship contender right until the final race of last season, Greg Biffle has had a quiet start to the 2006 campaign and while he admits that he isn’t among the favourites for
Daytona 500 glory, he still has plenty of interesting views on the current NASCAR garage gossip.
Q
WHAT ARE YOUR VIEWS ON WHAT IS ACCEPTABLE AND UNACCEPTABLE BUMP DRAFTING?
Greg Biffle
“Coming off the corner and pushing the guy before he’s quite straight. Maybe bumping a guy right going into the tri-oval or right coming off the tri-oval or getting in the corner, those are areas that we don’t need to be pushing each other. If it’s on the straightaway and everybody is straight and in the line and you come up and you shove the guy a little bit and get a little advantage, that’s OK. But to constantly be jamming a guy’s bumper all the way around is just not safe.”
Q
WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT THE CHAD KNAUS SITUATION?
Greg Biffle
“I really didn’t see exactly what went on there. I went home for the two days and took a little time off and just have been reading what I saw on the internet. I really don’t know what happened. There’s some kind of device or what not that changed the aerodynamics. If it’s on purpose, that’s a real black mark on us. We try and get what we can through tech and then NASCAR officials say, ‘Hey, bang that in a little bit,’ or ‘Make that a little straighter.’ That’s fine, but if you have something that changes it after you go through inspection, they get a little unhappy about that.”
Q
WHAT IS CHAD’S REPUTATION IN THE GARAGE?
Greg Biffle
“I think he has a decent reputation in the garage about being very smart and getting the most out of his race cars and that’s what it is – optimising the rules. That’s what I like to call it. That’s the word I love – optimising the rules – meaning taking it to the maximum point without getting in trouble. There are two sides to that. It’s like trying to get a driver to speed up. If you can’t get a driver to stay on the gas, that’s harder than to get a driver that’s too aggressive to back off a little bit. If you don’t have a crew chief that’s trying and pushing that envelope, you’re never gonna be at the same competition level as all of your competitors. So it is a necessary evil, but we have to watch also what type of things we’re doing.”
Q
AS SOMEONE WHO WAS NOT IN THE SHOOTOUT. WHAT WAS YOUR TAKE WATCHING IT?
Greg Biffle
“Man, they should have had the blood pressure cuff on my arm when I was sitting in the bus watching the thing on TV. It was incredible. I was on the edge of my seat couching down like I was hanging on because I thought the wreck was coming. It looked aggressive. I think that’s why NASCAR is putting into effect some of these bump-drafting rules and hoping that guys will calm down a little bit. Let’s respect one another and not cause a big accident, plus these cars – the older this racetrack gets and the more years on it, the harder these cars are to drive. I was just out there and it’s a handful to drive and I was around 15 cars and not 40, so it’s a big deal.”
Q
DO YOU EXPECT TO SEE A CALMER DUEL TOMORROW?
Greg Biffle
“Possible. After the Shootout, yes, and with NASCAR kind of putting their finger on it, I think that we’re gonna maybe see guys take it a little more easy. Plus you’ve got to remember that this is our 500 car. Everybody that has a car here wants to race that car in the 500. They know if they get a little over-anxious and get the thing torn up that they’re gonna have to go to a backup and not have any laps on it and that’s not gonna be good.”
