H
HardScrabble
Guest
Interesting little story from the Busch series race this past weekend at Memphis.
David Reutimann put the #7 on the pole, but everyone knew that Greg Biffle would pilot the car on Saturday and would have to move to the back of the field. When a car is moved to the back of the field from the starting grid, rather than all the cars folowing in the field up one spot, the line from which the car is removed is slid forward to fill the gap. It is also a rule that the winner of the pole may elect to start on either the insdie or outside front row position. All this set up an interesting possibility for Ford and Greg Biffle.
If Greg moved from inside the front row to the rear of the field, it moved Brian Vickers and his Chevy from the third starting position to the front row alongside the CHevy of Kyle Busch. But if Greg claimed the outside starting position and then moved to the rear of the field, Bobby Hamilton would move his Ford up to the front row along side Kyle and Jason Keller would move his Ford up to the second row outside slot. Needless to say Ford, who has Mr. Biffle under contract so to speak, told Greg to claim the outside position of the front row.
Also needless to say, the Chevy teams saw the plan and protested to NASCAR. The Busch officials had apparently never been confronted with quite this same situation before. As a matter of fact I don't know that NASCAR had ever face this interpretation of the rules before. Phone calls flew between Memphis and Daytona to sort it out. NASCAR ruled that since Greg did not qualify the car, he could not make the choice of inside or outside.
David Reutimann put the #7 on the pole, but everyone knew that Greg Biffle would pilot the car on Saturday and would have to move to the back of the field. When a car is moved to the back of the field from the starting grid, rather than all the cars folowing in the field up one spot, the line from which the car is removed is slid forward to fill the gap. It is also a rule that the winner of the pole may elect to start on either the insdie or outside front row position. All this set up an interesting possibility for Ford and Greg Biffle.
If Greg moved from inside the front row to the rear of the field, it moved Brian Vickers and his Chevy from the third starting position to the front row alongside the CHevy of Kyle Busch. But if Greg claimed the outside starting position and then moved to the rear of the field, Bobby Hamilton would move his Ford up to the front row along side Kyle and Jason Keller would move his Ford up to the second row outside slot. Needless to say Ford, who has Mr. Biffle under contract so to speak, told Greg to claim the outside position of the front row.
Also needless to say, the Chevy teams saw the plan and protested to NASCAR. The Busch officials had apparently never been confronted with quite this same situation before. As a matter of fact I don't know that NASCAR had ever face this interpretation of the rules before. Phone calls flew between Memphis and Daytona to sort it out. NASCAR ruled that since Greg did not qualify the car, he could not make the choice of inside or outside.
