 | | Crew chief Doug Richert made the call to take just two tires on the final pit stop, and Greg Biffle did the rest. Credit: Autostock |
By Ryan Smithson, NASCAR.COM
November 21, 2005
02:34 PM EST (19:34 GMT)
HOMESTEAD, Fla. -- Doug Richert says that watching the Busch Series race Saturday night helped him decide to take just two tires on the last stop of the Ford 400. Richert's driver, Greg Biffle, got his series-leading sixth win because of the call. Biffle restarted third with two laps to go, but he says his car was able to work well on just two tires.  |  | | Carl Edwards led the most laps at HMS, but he didn't lead the last one. Credit: Autostock |
| |
| Ford 400 |
| Official Results |
| Pos. |
Driver |
Start |
Led |
| 1. |
G. Biffle |
7 |
9 |
| 2. |
M. Martin |
5 |
2 |
| 3. |
M. Kenseth |
17 |
0 |
| 4. |
C. Edwards |
1 |
94 |
| 5. |
C. Mears |
6 |
75 |
| 6. |
D. Blaney |
11 |
6 |
| 7. |
R. Newman |
2 |
33 |
| 8. |
K. Harvick |
14 |
1 |
| 9. |
J. Gordon |
12 |
39 |
| 10. |
J. Mayfield |
13 |
0 |
|
|
 |
"We put two tires there for the last run and I was awesome," Biffle said. "It was perfect. It took me all night to get my car where it was. Doug did a great job, kept working on it and working on it." "I watched the Busch race when two tires seemed to hold off pretty darn good," said Richert, crew chief for the No. 16 Ford. "With the limited laps, everyone was going to be thinking the same thing, too." Not this time for Edwards On the other side of the coin, Edwards requested four tires on the final stop, and he couldn't win after restarting 12th. Edwards was going off his experience two weeks ago at Texas when he bulldozed the field with four fresh tires, but he had restarted sixth there. "I knew Carl had a good car all night, and I knew Carl was going to be a threat, but there was enough cars this time between us and him that you got to fight to get by," Richert said. "Sometimes four tries can't [make] up [track position]." "We went in this thing and we pitted with four and I thought we could make it back up there," said Edwards, who still managed to pass eight cars in only 11 laps and finish fourth. "It's still fun." Blaney rolls dice for best finish of year It's a sad irony when lame-duck drivers close their tenures with solid runs. Dave Blaney's overlooked performance at Homestead -- he spent 220 laps in the top 10 -- was the kind of result Richard Childress was looking for when he hired Blaney before the 2005 season. Blaney's team elected to stay out during the last caution, and Blaney only lost a handful of positions on old tires. He wound up sixth, easily his best finish of the year. |  | ALSO | |
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"We took a gamble there at the end and gained a couple of spots out there. We were pretty happy with that run," Blaney said. "It was uneventful and nothing bad happened. We just kept getting a little bit better at the end, but not just good enough." Quotable |  | | Casey Mears led 75 laps, but a caution for debris relegated him to a fifth-place finish. Credit: Autostock |
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"Whether we took two tires or four tires wouldn't have made any difference at the end. The caution just killed us. We couldn't go at the beginning of the run."
-- Casey Mears, who was headed to victory before a caution for debris flew with 14 laps to go "We had come from 25th to 18th and we were going forward and got wrecked on pit road. It's a darn shame, things like that."
-- Ricky Rudd, who was hit exiting pit road during his first stop | 
