Struggling Roush teams rue Hendrick advantage (cont'd)

Whatever advantage the Hendrick cars possess was evident at Indianapolis, a flat track with many similar characteristics to Pocono.

"We ran decent at Indy, but [Mark Martin] and [Johnson] were faster than us. It's just that simple. We were a little better than [Tony Stewart], which gives us some confidence, but still the two Hendrick cars were beating us, and we've got to figure out how to beat them or be better."

For Kenseth, it's being able to finish what he's started.

"We haven't been able to finish as good as we've been running -- up until last week -- for a long time, and that's important," Kenseth said. "Even if you're off a little bit in performance, at least to finish where you're running or try to get a better finish than where you're running through pit strategy or fuel mileage or something like that. We haven't been able to do that. We've been on the wrong end of that, and that's part of the reason why we are where we are in the points."

That's particularly the case for Biffle at Pocono. In 13 starts here, he has just two top-10 finishes.

"This race track and myself have a love-hate relationship that we're trying to work through," Biffle said. "I think it's a lot of fun to race on. I love the way it's laid out. But I can't remember a time we've been that we haven't run in the top five, but we could never finish there.

"For instance, the last race. We led, we ran second to Carl for a long time, passed [Johnson], the green flag would come out and I would pass [Stewart]. We ran there all day long and then it comes down to the last run of the day and we don't make it and have to pit for fuel. So it really hurts to not finish where you've been running."

Edwards, for one, is not one to throw in the towel -- although one would have come in handy, as persistent bands of heavy showers peppered Pocono all afternoon.

"There's [16] races left, I guess, and so far Matt Kenseth's won two really big races, and we could still go win 10 races as a team, so I'm not willing to write anything off," Edwards said. "I still feel like we can win this championship. I feel very strongly that we can win it, so I guess we'll just have to keep our heads up and keep moving forward and keep working on it.

"If anybody figures out how come we kind of go like that, you let me know. Hopefully, the worst of our trough, we're through that. I feel like we're on our way up. I hope it's true."

• Sound Off: Edwards | Biffle