Conversation: C. Edwards (cont'd)

Q: The in-house change, where your Nationwide crew chief Drew Blickensderfer was promoted to the Cup Series with your teammate Matt Kenseth's team, was announced when you were in England, so how did it come down?

Edwards: It's a good move for [Drew] and in the back of my mind, I knew that this was a big possibility for a long time because I just knew that Matt and Drew had had success together on the Nationwide side and I thought 'if Drew and I go out and do really well, that's the logical next step,' as long as Chip [Bolin, Roush Fenway engineer who was serving as Kenseth's crew chief] was cool with it and it would work out like it did.

Swap at the top

Drew Blickensderfer is leaving Carl Edwards and the No. 60 Roush Fenway Nationwide team to replace Chip Bolin as crew chief of the No. 17 Ford in the Cup Series.

• Complete story, click here
• Stillman named No. 60 chief

I thought it could happen, so in a way I half expected it. But it was cool. Robbie [Reiser, Roush Fenway general manager] called me and said 'this is what we're thinking, are you OK with this?' I was totally OK with it because it's an opportunity for Drew and if that's what Matt wants, that's what we have to do because it's important that Matt and Chip and those guys win races. And it meant a lot that they asked me if it was all right, because they didn't have to do that.

Q: How do you feel about working with Dan Stillman, and will you do any testing to ease that transition or just wait for Speedweeks?

Edwards: Honestly, I think it'll be better off for Drew and I not to be together because to get Dan, with everything I've heard about him, it's going to be a positive move. I don't know if we have a plan to test, but if we don't test I'm sure we'll sit down and have a good talk and I hope will be available on Saturdays during the races to help us out. I'm sure he will.

But Dan's a professional. With what I've heard about him, and just the short time we've spent talking on the phone, I don't think we're going to have any trouble.

Q: With testing mostly being eliminated, how are you looking at this January?

Edwards: I don't know if it'll be the best January I've ever had in my life, but it'll be the least busy one I've had in the past four or five years, and that'll be nice. There's not a solid test on my schedule that I know of, yet [because] I believe we're still trying to adhere to the spirit of the no-testing policy. I hope that doesn't hurt us, but I think the least testing we can do in the sport as a whole is good. We've got to test as much as everybody else does, but I don't think the idea at Roush Fenway is to test as much as we can.

I'm excited about getting to spend some time and getting to do some things we won't be able to do throughout the year -- maybe go some places or spend some time with people that I won't be able to see throughout the season.