Greg Biffle Texas II post-qualifying interview

Greg Biffle, Roush Fenway Racing Ford

Photo by: Ashley Dickerson, ASP Inc.

GREG BIFFLE – No. 16 3M Ford Fusion – Pole winner

“It was a great lap for us. Our car was really, really fast right off the truck. That’s just a tribute to my team and how hard they’ve worked and how far we’ve come as a team this season. It was a great lap. We had been fast all through practice and made about six qualifying attempts at it, but it was a pretty uneventful lap. I felt like I could have got back to the gas a little bit sooner in three and four. I’m sure everybody felt like that, but one one-thousandth of a second is not a huge margin to beat David by.”

WHAT ABOUT ROUSH GOING 1-2-3. “That’s really exciting that our race cars are that good. It’s just a tribute to our driver lineup, the guys at the race shop, Doug Yates with the engine shop how far they’ve come with this FR9 – all those things are a big factor in our cars being up front at these mile-and-a-half race tracks. We had a really, really fast car at Charlotte a few weeks back and this car is really no exception.”

HAVE YOU PUT MORE EMPHASIS ON QUALIFYING THIS YEAR? “Ever since Matt (Puccia) came on board we’ve put a little more emphasis on qualifying and also there are two things that play a factor in that. One is the draw for qualifying goes off practice speeds, so it kind of forced our hand to come here on Friday and start in qualifying trim, which we never do. We come here and start in race trim historically all the time, and then switch to qualifying – make two or three runs and be ready to qualify. Then wherever you drew, you drew. It was luck of the draw. You could go out sixth or you could go out 43rd, so, basically, not NASCAR but the rules have forced us into getting a good draw for qualifying, so it’s up to us and we have to come here in qualifying trim. I made a total of seven laps today – now eight – the whole day. That’s all I’ve done today and I get a little apprehensive, I get a little aggravated because I want to make laps and I like to drive the race car more than eight laps, but I understand what we’re trying to do. We’re trying to get a starting spot for Sunday, we’re trying to get a good qualifying draw and have to wait for tomorrow. It’ll be a restless night tonight waiting for tomorrow to when I can go out and make 10-lap runs, so that’s been a factor in us qualifying better. We’re spending more time on qualifying because of the way the qualifying draw is.” SO YOU

HAVE NOT BEEN IN RACE TRIM TODAY? “None. A lot of guys do that now. I think probably over half the field probably.”

IS IT A PLUS TOMORROW THAT YOU CAN JUST CONCENTRATE ON RACE TRIM? “Yeah, that definitely can be something we can focus on. We kind of anticipate that tomorrow is all race trim and getting the car to drive really well is the most important thing. We’ve got to keep an eye on weather and all those things in case it looks like we might lose some practice and it forces our hand to practice some today in race trim, but that didn’t look like it was gonna be an issue, so I’m looking forward to tomorrow.”