Trouble in Turn2

As much as I enjoy acting like I know what happened during a particular Sprint Cup race, the fact is I have very little inside information. So what better way to recap a race weekend than through the people that actually participated.

• First up, Matt Kenseth relays what happened to his car.
  

  It’s disappointing, but it all started back on the restart. Jeff is kind of famous for laying back and NASCAR has a rule that you can’t lay back more than a car length or you can be black-flagged, but it’s usually not enforced, so I saw him laying back. I knew he was gonnna get a run on me, so I laid back a little bit. Carl went late and that kind of started the chain and we were three-wide going into one. We came off two and I was up as high as I thought I could get and Jeff just came across. Whether it was on purpose or not, it just kind of wiped us out.

  Certainly a frustrating finish for Kenseth. Dale Earnhardt Jr and Kenseth both mentioned cars laying back on restarts, which is certainly a gray area that everyone plays with. It’s kind of NASCAR’s version of a lane violation in basketball. It’s rarely called unless it’s blatant.

• Greg Biffle on his run at Las Vegas:
  

  Had a lot of fun. I mean, this is the most fun I’ve had driving a racecar in probably a year or two. A lot of times these races are real stressful, a lot of pressure. I feel really good getting out of the car right now.

  After two dismal years, it sounds like Biffle and the #16 team have figured some things out. That’s bad news for opponents.

• More Biffle, this time on the difference for Roush this year:

  Robbie Reiser really made the biggest difference probably at our company, you know, getting us turned around and pointed in the right direction. The end of last year, you know, before he moved into this general manager or competition director, the end of last year, he kind of headed up the testing and got that start. Before the second Loudon race is when that thing really came to life. So he’s been working in that position kind of since then. And it’s the reflection of his hard work and, you know, all the engineering department, everybody, fab shop, just starting to pay off.

  Both Biffle and Carl Edwards pointed to Reiser as the reason for the improvement. The move obviously hasn’t affected the #17 very much so far, so it looks like a great personnel move for Roush-Fenway.

• Jack Roush elaborates on this point and includes a not-so-subtle shot at Toyota:
  

  In anticipation of the additional manufacturer coming into the sport, what their reputation has been, I’m not going to name the manufacturer, but there’s expectations they would smother us, they would drown us with engineering, they would drown us with technology, they would come and recruit our best people, that they would leave us in the backwater. I was determined not to let that happen.
  I had contact with my friends at Ford, Edsel Ford, and of course Dan Davis, and Doug (indiscernible), about what the challenges were. And Ford Motor Company has put into our program at least 30% more in 2008 than they did in 2007. I’m sorry, 2007 they put in more than they did in 2006. That allowed us to get the tire engineer we needed. It allowed us to get the staff behind the seven post. It allowed us to more effectively utilize our K and C machines. It allowed us to make the preparations internally.
  The guy who is right on top of that of course is Chris Andrews. And Robbie Reiser on the heels of Max Jones is doing a great job in the shop organizing it. But we’ve got the resources now for the level of commitment that I’m aware of that the other manufacturers have made. We’ve got the resources to be competitive. Without Ford’s support, we couldn’t have done that.

  Thanks for not naming names, Jack.

• Red Bull made a driver change, temporary or permanent is unknown, moving Mike Skinner into the #84 for AJ Allmendinger.
  

  “We can’t keep missing races. It’s just not an option,” said general manager Jay Frye, hired in January to turn around the second-year Red Bull program.

  “We’re looking at several different ideas, all aimed at figuring out what’s wrong with that program, how we can fix it and how we can get that car into races. But it can’t continue the way it is. It just can’t.”

  No one should be surprised that Allmendinger has struggled to make races. The most surprising part is why Red Bull waited until now to get Allmendinger more seat time in the two lower tier series. For Skinner’s part, he qualified the Bill Davis Racing #27 car fifth and finished 30th at Las Vegas.

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