Success is back at Roush, and the owner is loving it

Remember when Jack Roush complained that he was going to need a baseball bat to fend off the charge Toyota was mounting in Sprint Cup Series racing?

Remember when Roush was all up in arms over a part supposedly swiped and presumably copied by Michael Waltrip Racing?

Remember when Roush was upset with NASCAR in general for, he said, misleading him on testing rules and regulations heading into the "new car" era? And at Hendrick Motorsports in particular for bending said rules and regulations every which way to pave a repeated path to Victory Lane en route to Jimmie Johnson's second consecutive championship in 2007?

Well, Captain Jack is all smiles these days -- and with good reason. Greg Biffle's victory in last Sunday's Camping World RV 400 at Dover was the second in a row for Biffle's No. 16 Roush Fenway Racing Ford.

Furthermore, Biffle finished just ahead of Roush Fenway teammates Matt Kenseth and Carl Edwards, giving Roush his first 1-2-3 finish since the final race of the 2005 season when his cars swept the top four spots in the season finale at Homestead. Of course, that did little to take the sting off losing that 2005 points championship to Tony Stewart and Joe Gibbs Racing -- as Biffle, despite a series-high six wins that season, finished second in the final standings, a mere 35 points behind Stewart.

Roush joked later that Sunday's duel down the stretch between the top-three cars in his swollen five-car stable was at times difficult for him to watch. In what comes as a surprise to absolutely no one, he actually feared the worst.

"It's just hard not to lose your mind when you've got as many opportunities as there are with the multiple cars to be involved in something that's just going to break your heart," he told the media after the race. "You're just holding your breath, breathing too fast -- both at the same time -- as you watch it unfold."

Victor's spoils

In the end, Roush had nothing to fear but victory itself.

In winning for the second week in a row, Biffle made history. He is the first driver to win the first two races in the Chase -- and in doing so, he has vaulted himself from the back of the playoff field to the front.

Heading into this Sunday's race at Kansas, where Biffle is the defending champion, The Biff is only 10 points off the first-place pace being set by Edwards, his Roush Fenway teammate. These guys are looking more and more like their Red Sox brethren every day, even if Edwards, by his own admission, doesn't know the difference between a curveball and a cut fastball.

And by that, we mean the Roush Fenway racing guys are looking more like the Red Sox who have won two of the last four World Series and seem to be building momentum and a case for possibly making it three out of the last five -- and not the Red Sox of the previous baseball millennium who routinely choked away chances of post-season glory.

Biffle is thriving in racing's version of the post-season. He's a true contender now, winning at the right time and fielding the perfect blend of confidence behind the wheel and a fast car underneath his slender frame. People tend to forget that he knows how to go after NASCAR championships, having won the Truck Series title in 2000 and the Nationwide Series title in 2002.

"There is no doubt in my mind that Greg is ready to win a [Cup] championship," Roush stated flatly after Biffle opened the Chase with a win in New Hampshire.

Like Sen. John McCain in his bid to become the next President of the United States, it was in New Hampshire where Biffle began his comeback story. He had not won a single race all season prior to capturing the Sylvania 300 there, and suddenly now he finds himself one of the guys to beat in the Chase as others, most notably top Chase seed Kyle Busch, have fallen by the wayside just as frighteningly quick as Biffle has risen to the top.

Senior driver, senior owner

Roush jokes that when Mark Martin was his senior driver for many years, there was no question whose pit box he was going to sit on for the races. But now, with not only Biffle and Edwards in the Chase but also Kenseth, life is not so simple for the quirky little man with the straw hat.

Then again, he tries to keep it that way. He says with Martin gone, Biffle, now in his sixth full year with the organization, is the senior man in his mind.

"When Mark retired [the first time, before he un-retired], we put the mantle of being the elder, senior guy on Greg," Roush said. "I moved in with him. I will move off the 16 box when it's clear that one of the other cars is going to win, just because I need to show the right amount of support for what they're doing. Except for that, my home is the 16's pit box, and I was there all day [last Sunday]."

Um, never mind that there is the little matter of Kenseth being the actual senior driver at Roush Fenway in terms of length of service. He has been with Jack since 1999, driving full-time at the Cup level since 2000 -- making this Kenseth's ninth season of doing so for Roush.

Never mind that Edwards currently leads the point standings, or that Edwards tops all Roush Fenway drivers with six victories this season. The 16 pit box apparently is where Roush wants to be.

"I got off the 16 box one time when I made a mid-race trip to the bathroom," he said of Sunday's race. "Except for that, I was right there. And I picked it between stops, where I was pretty sure nothing was going to happen for that moment."

The team owner is always plotting, always thinking. You have to wonder if he had an employee charting when Rick Hendrick was going to the bathroom just to make sure the competition wasn't getting a leg up, so to speak, on him.

But if part of Roush's genius is to think the other guy might be getting away with something -- if that's part of what drives him to get his group to perform better -- then a tip of the straw hat to him. It's working.

Roush Fenway now has a total of eight race victories in its Fords this season, second only to the nine posted by Joe Gibbs Racing in its Toyotas -- and well ahead of all the rest of the teams out there (Hendrick has five in its Chevrolets, while Richard Childress Racing has two in its Chevys, same as Penske Racing and Gillett Evernham Motorsports in their Dodges).

Now suddenly everyone else is starting to wonder what Roush is doing that they are not. That, and figuring out which pit box to pee off of because so many of his cars are in contention, are nice problems for any team owner to have.

Also
Roush the big winner with sweep of top three spots
Biffle becomes serious title threat with second victory
Loop data shows stars could be aligning for Biffle