Phoenix International Raceway has been very good to Kevin Harvick. The California native and Richard Childress Racing driver has competed on the 1-mile track in a variety of different series, sweeping both Nextel Cup events there last year. Calling the shots for both of those victories was crew chief Todd Berrier, who switched to RCR's No. 29 team in 2003. The 37-year-old Kernersville, N.C., native has won 11 races with Harvick, including the Brickyard 400 in 2003 and the Daytona 500 this year.

As Berrier will admit, it's been a tough year for the men who set up cars on NASCAR's premier series. Sunday's race in Phoenix will be the last this season for the Car of Tomorrow, which becomes the standard chassis on what will be called the Sprint Cup Series in 2008. Berrier took a few minutes before last week's race at Texas to talk about going back to the desert and trying to get a handle on the COT.

Q: You guys swept the two races in Phoenix last season, and finished 10th there in the spring. What's the confidence level like going back?

Berrier: The past success does help. Success with Kevin, and [RCR teammate] Clint [Bowyer] winning Loudon -- a lot of those things are similar. A lot of things help. So going there you feel like you have a little bit of an edge compared to some of the other places that you go.

Q: You're going from a night spring race to an afternoon fall race. Does the track change?

Berrier: It's not a lot of change. The biggest thing is, we're running the Car of Tomorrow there, and since we ran it the first time, it was so early in the season, there have been a lot of things that we feel we've learned and gotten better at over the last couple of months. So there will be several things different on our side than there were the last time we were there. So it's probably more of a car change and us getting smarter and a lot of things changing in our setups. So you'll have to fight that a little bit when you get there, just trying to get that in tune with the track.

Q: Do you have a better handle on COT than you did for the spring race?

Berrier: I think we do have a better handle on it than we did in the spring. I think we were really good in the spring. You keep working hard and you make changes and you think you get smarter and smarter. I think we are better, but we could also leave there thinking, 'Man, we should have left it the way we were in the first race.' But I feel like we've gotten a fair amount better with the car. Having tires to test with is something we don't have now, so you've just got to go from race to race and do your development from one race to the next. A year ago, we would have had tires to go to Iowa or Milwaukee or places like that to get ready for Phoenix. This year, it's just a little bit different.

Q: You mentioned changes in the car. How much has it changed?

Berrier: The car itself, as far as the tech side of it and the NASCAR side of it, hasn't changed that much. In the area of the front clip, the front geometry that we're allowed to work with, a lot of that stuff is different. We'll have a whole new spindle package, the clip will be at the different height. It will be a lot different than it was there before. And a really big change isn't really going to equate to a lot. It's not like it's going to be a half a second quicker. It's just a little bit of something the driver feels, but it makes big changes when we get there.

Q: Phoenix is the last COT race of the season. What kind of effort has it taken to implement this car?

Berrier: It's been tremendously a pain in the neck. It's been really hard to do. To run both cars parallel like we have, it's like having two racing teams running parallel. And next year, running the Car of Tomorrow all the time, it'll be easier on us from a car and parts standpoint, but we've still not raced them on a mile-and-a-half. So all the evolution from first Phoenix to second Phoenix, were going to go through from first Atlanta to second Atlanta, from first Charlotte to second Charlotte. So we have another set of problems that we didn't have. A year from now, it's going to be a lot easier, but next year is going to be very similar to this year as far as the evolution of the car and what's going to have to change to make it so we can drive them on mile-and-a-halfs.

Q: So are you looking forward to fact that you're going full time with the COT?

Berrier: I'm looking forward to the fact that I'm doing it full time with something next year, one or the other or whatever it is. It's really hard on the teams and the owners. The money, it takes cubic dollars to run these racing teams. We're actually running six racing teams among three sponsors and three groups of people because we have to have the same number Cars of Tomorrow as we have to have current cars. Economically, it was total disaster for every team out here this year. I don't see next year being a lot different, because you're still going to have to do your development on them on mile-and-a-halfs while you're racing them. The changes that you make nowadays are going to be a lot harder to find, so you have to spend a lot more money for a lot less. We're looking for a little bit of an advantage because our box is so tight. You're going to have to throw the same amount of money at it that you were throwing before, but you're only going to find a tenth of what you found before because the box is so much tighter. Having it full time is a positive for sure, but we're still going to have to spend money to make it better. You can't stop the teams you're racing against from spending money.

Q: So it will be 2009 maybe before you begin to see any cost savings?

Berrier: I think the winter of '08 will be the first time anyone will take a breath and realize, all right, maybe we do have a plan, and we recognize what next year is going to bring. Right now, every team knows as little about next year as they did this year, because it's the exact same circumstance. We're still running a different car at the mile-and-a-halfs, something we haven't done before. I'm not saying by the time next October and Charlotte rolls around that we won't be zeroed in on it. But up until that point, it's still going to be pretty hard.

Q: Darlington is all about tires. Atlanta is hard on engines. What's the concern area at Phoenix?

Berrier: It's a short race, so you have to really have your act together, and you have to do it quick and you've got to have your track position the whole time. You have 334 laps to do something at a place like [Texas], which is 500 miles. There, you've got 300 miles to go. The tires don't mean that much there. Track position means a lot. If your car is off a bit, you can't afford to pit and lose your track position, so you have to suffer with an ill-handling car because the consequences are worse by pitting and making the car better, because you can't pass anybody. It's maybe just track position and pitting at the right time and being really good to start with.

Q: Two weeks left in the season. Are you counting the days?

Berrier: Absolutely, we're counting the days. It feels like this year, up until when the Chase started, flew by. And since then, we've had flat tires, our luck hasn't been the greatest, and at this point you can't get it over with fast enough. We've still got two races we're going to do our best to win. But at the end of the day, you're looking forward to sitting back for two or three days and taking a breath and putting down on paper a plan that you think is going to propel you to a better season next year.