Notes: Biffle paces Happy Hour, wants to stay at RFR

CONCORD, N.C. -- Greg Biffle's lap of 183.655 mph was fastest in Friday night's final practice for the Bank of America 500 at Lowe's Motor Speedway.

Biffle will start 10th in Saturday night's event.

With about 20 minutes to go in the session, Kevin Harvick spun off Turn 4 but didn't hit anything. Tony Raines was slowest in the practice, more than 5 mph off Biffle's pace at 179.104 mph.

Matt Kenseth, Biffle's Roush Fenway Racing teammate was quickest in Friday's first practice session held in the late afternoon with a lap clocked at 180.935 mph.

Biffle sings different tune

Like the woman he is about the marry (nuptials will be exchanged next Wednesday with his long-time fiance Nicole Lunders), Biffle retains the right to change his mind. And so he has, when it comes to his contract status with Roush Fenway Racing.

Biffle, who is under contract through 2008, said earlier he wanted to get an extension done with Roush Fenway prior to the end of the season. The implication was that he would look elsewhere if that wasn't going to be the case. But now, with 3M signing as the primary sponsor for the No. 16 car he is driving, he admitted he is singing a different tune.

"There's no doubt I'm here in 2008. Even beyond that, I have a 90 percent feeling that I'm going to be back here," Biffle said at Lowe's Motor Speedway, where he is preparing for Saturday's Bank of America 500.

Yet he said he now is comfortable waiting until after the season to finalize an extension.

"Right now, that's really on the backburner. Probably this winter, we'll start talking about it, start getting moving forward on an extension since we've got 3M signed up for a multi-year deal," Biffle said. "It's sort of backwards, because a lot of times, you've got to have a driver to sell the sponsor. So I'm sure 3M is like, if Greg's around, we are. Not a problem. That's really what it boils down to. And when everything gets calmed down, we'll get to negotiating again."

Elliott comes back for more

Even after all these years, Bill Elliott still loves being around the garage on his terms.

Not since 2003 has Elliott run a full season. Every year since, though, he's run a few races here and there and the schedule suits him just fine. Dale Jarrett announced that he will retire from full-time competition after the first five races of 2008, but Elliott said it would be difficult to walk away completely.

"We're kinda the older generation, and I think the older generation can probably [run limited schedules]," Elliott said. "You hear Jeff Gordon and a lot of guys talk about when they walk away, they're just gonna do it and that's it. Rusty pretty much did it. He said that he wasn't driving anything else any more and that was it. For me, it's just hard to quit cold turkey.

"I still enjoy coming to the racetrack. I still have a lot of friends in the garage area and there are still a lot of people I like to see and keep up with."

Elliott returns to the Wood Brothers/JTG Racing team this weekend, after it fell out of the top 35 in owner's points last week. As it turned out, however, Elliott's past champion's provisional wasn't needed after he made the field on speed.

His partial schedule, Elliott says, allows him a release from the incredible pressure cooker that is today's Nextel Cup garage.

"To deal with the pressure week in and week out gets unbearable at times," Elliott said. "If ... you have a good stretch and everything is running good and clicking along, you can overlook a lot of things, but when things start going bad -- you've got a family, you're away from home a lot, you're testing a lot, you're doing sponsor commitments and fan commitments -- it's about more than you can bear.

"It just gets to a point where [you say], 'Hey, I need a timeout. I've got to clear my head and start over again.' You used to be able to do that over the winter, but now there's so much pressure year-round that it's hard to do."

Stewart gets Daytona Nationwide Series, World of Outlaws sponsor

Armor All will sponsor Tony Stewart in next year's Nationwide Series season opener at Daytona, but the working relationship won't end there. Tony Stewart Racing driver Donny Schatz will also have Armor All backing for the entire 2008 World of Outlaws campaign.

As part of the agreement, the company will make a $50,000 donation to the Tony Stewart Foundation, and the three-time Cup champion will also appear on product packaging. There's more. The driver will appear in print and television ads for Armor All, some of which have already been filmed.

"I'm excited about it," Stewart said. "The people from Armor All have been an absolute blast. When you see the spot, you'll realize we had a pretty good time shooting it. The stuff that won't make the cut was even funnier. We had a good time with it."

While Stewart fields a handful of teams in various USAC open-wheel divisions, he'd previously only run one on the World of Outlaws circuit. He's looking forward to bringing a multi-team mentality to WoO.

"It's neat for us to finally expand to a two-car team," Stewart said. "There's not very many of the World of Outlaw teams that have branched out past one car. So I think maybe we're gonna be one of the first teams to adopt the Cup aspect of utilizing resources and sharing information. Hopefully, we can take both teams even higher competition-wise."

Carlson introduced as national champion

As racing seasons go, Steve Carlson had a fairly decent one.

Check that. He had an amazing season at Lacrosse Fairgrounds Speedway in Wisconsin, one in which he scored 20 top-five finishes in 23 starts en route to the NASCAR Whelen All-American Series National Championship. Carlson, in racing for 32 years, is also a nine-time champion of the former NASCAR Elite Division, Midwest Series.

"This is by far the biggest title I've ever won," Carlson said Friday afternoon during a press conference at Lowe's Motor Speedway. "All the drivers and all the teams in Canada and Mexico and this country, we beat 'em all. This is the biggest win by far because I don't just race against 25 other guys. I race against a whole bunch of 'em [from across the country]."

Tim Jacobs fields the Chevrolets that Carlson drives at Lacrosse, as well as those of Kevin Nuttleman and Emily Sue Steck. Nuttleman was second to Carlson in points at the Lacrosse short track and sixth in the nation, while Steck took rookie of the year honors.

Carlson's son, 19-year-old Michael, also races at Lacrosse. He was highly impressed by his surroundings at Lowe's Motor Speedway.

"Everything's cool about this," Carlson said. "This is actually the first time I've ever been here, and it's a pretty awesome place."