 | | The car in which Greg Biffle won the most races was lost in the Las Vegas tire crash. Credit: Autostock |
By Dave Rodman, NASCAR.COM
January 6, 2007
11:33 AM EST (16:33 GMT)
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- Daytona testing, which begins Monday with the first session of Preseason Thunder, is alternately ridiculed and reviled by many drivers in the Nextel Cup Series. But for Greg Biffle in 2007, the three-day test at Daytona International Speedway might be priceless for both medical and personal reasons. No less than 25 teams are expected to join Biffle's Roush Racing unit for the test, primarily for those that finished in odd positions in the 2006 Cup owner standings, led by champion driver Jimmie Johnson. Among the other teams expected are those of 2006 Chase contenders Kevin Harvick, Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Kasey Kahne; as well as new teams for veterans Joe Nemechek, Dale Jarrett and Brian Vickers, the latter two set to debut Toyota Camrys at Daytona testing, along with Bill Davis Racing's Dave Blaney. "Daytona testing gives you the chance to get back in the swing of things after the holidays," said Harvick, who finished fourth in the 2006 series standings. "It gives you momentum heading into the Budweiser Shootout and the Daytona 500, and it also helps you see where you stack up against other teams." It'll serve a couple more purposes this year for Biffle. The last time Biffle was in one of his Roush Racing Ford Fusions, he survived probably the worst accident of his NASCAR career, when he hit a wall at Las Vegas Motor Speedway during a Goodyear tire test in early December. "I'm doing pretty good, physically," Biffle said. "I mean, my shoulder is still sore and it kind of pops and cracks a little bit when I move it the wrong way." Since the accident Biffle, a former state high-school wrestling champion in his home state of Washington, has engaged in physical therapy, announced his engagement to longtime girlfriend Nicole Lunders and took trips to his mountain property in North Carolina, and another home in Mexico. "I've dislocated that shoulder two or three times, starting in high school, and the last time in the winter of 2001 -- but never in a car," Biffle said. "It's very abnormal for that to happen inside a racecar because 99 percent of the time, when people dislocate a shoulder, it comes out to the front. "Mine was a result of going against the shoulder brace [in the car] and then going forward -- and maybe kind of having a loose shoulder socket to begin with. Plus, maybe holding onto the steering wheel and bracing on that may have had something to do with it, too."  |  | PRESEASON THUNDER | Testing runs daily from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. ET, depending on weather and track conditions.
Fans have free access to a section of the Oldfield Grandstand each day, with access through the Daytona USA lobby.
On Jan. 9, for $15, fans may enter the track's infield Nextel Fanzone within the Nextel Cup garage area.
Included is an evening driver question-and-answer session, with drivers TBA.
Twenty-five drivers are on the list for the first three-day test session of Preseason Thunder.
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But Biffle said he's ready to test and thankful for the relative ease of driving Daytona's high-banked, 2.5-mile layout. "As far as driving, we're kind of the test dummies, so to speak, when it comes to testing at Daytona," Biffle said. "Because there is literally nothing we can do, as a driver, to get that car to go any faster under testing conditions for qualifying. "When it comes to racing, that's a whole different program, but not for testing. And it's almost the most boring testing for a driver, because there's nothing we can do." His lack of Daytona steering input aside, the Vegas misfortune interrupted a successful initial break-in period with an entirely new team for Biffle, who's heading into his fifth Cup season with Roush. Near the end of last season, team owner Jack Roush moved Biffle to work with the team that formerly fielded Mark Martin's Fords, headed by veteran chief mechanic Pat Tryson. The little more than a day they spent running at Las Vegas was positive, Biffle said. "I think [the test] was good, and we learned a lot," Biffle said. "I think we were definitely on the same page as far as our communication went. We had both cars running pretty fast." Probably the worst aspect of the Las Vegas testing accident, considering Biffle can still talk about it, is that it cost the team the car in which Biffle had won the last three season finale Ford 400s at Homestead-Miami Speedway, as well as seven of his 11 career victories. "That was disappointing [and] oh, my God, it's gone," Biffle said of the car. "It folded up the metal behind the driver's seat and parts that didn't have any damage from hitting the wall were deformed from the sheer impact of it. "That particular car was pretty special. Don't ask me why, but [at Vegas] at Lap 10 it was considerably faster than one of their 6 cars was [that was also at the test], down in the racetrack and a lot easier to drive. "But that was that car's characteristic, and it would do that if I compared it to my own second-best car. We had a meeting of all the engineers and chassis guys and body guys and nobody could figure out what was so special about that car. "There's no replacing that car. We've tried to replace it -- measured it and done everything -- but we just can't put out finger on exactly what it is about that car." Or what it was, in this case. Moving ahead, Biffle said he would use only one of the cars that wore the No. 16 a year ago, when Doug Richert was his crew chief. And he would have none of his former personnel, at least on the road. "The crew chief left, the engineer left and the shock guy, Al, left," Biffle said. "They needed Bobby [Bakeeff, car chief] to stay as the car chief because Jimmy Fennig wouldn't have had anybody. "We are taking a few of the 16 cars -- I don't know how many, but maybe just one or two. We were going to take the 239, but now that's trash -- so it will mostly be new builds, though we will use a few of the 6 cars, because I know those guys are going crazy, flat-out building stuff." But Biffle has a different mindset for Daytona testing, anyway. "Daytona is definitely a real reflection of the race team and the guys back at the chassis shop -- what they've accomplished, and things like that," Biffle said. "And a lot of it is the engine, as well [because] we know that four or five horsepower is worth a tenth of a second in restrictor-plate testing. |  | | Nine years the girlfriend, Nicole Lunders in now Greg Biffle's fiancee. Credit: Doug Benc/Getty Images |
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"It's the team's time to play, to test and tune, putting different pieces of metal on and off and changing springs and shock dampening on the front, which we're allowed to do. So it's kind of in their hands to get speed out of the racecar. "And it's not like I'm a wily veteran at this, but you know what you've got the first day you're there. You're not going to pick up half a second, unless you've got something major wrong, like brakes dragging or something like that. "All that metal on the body, from front to back, really makes up your speed, and you can only fine tune it at the test." So for Biffle and many other drivers, Daytona becomes a more critical personal exercise. "I see Daytona kind of as a bonding time for a lot of guys, because you're doing a lot of standing around while you cool the engine down, and stuff like that," Biffle said. "A lot of those things are time consuming and that's why we have three days -- so you end up spending a lot of time around the guys. "We absolutely make it a point to schedule things away from the racetrack. We go to the go-kart track or we go to dinner, which we did at Vegas. That's a good chance to get to know everybody, because during the season there just isn't time, so testing is the perfect opportunity to get together and do stuff with the guys." | 
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