Team: Roush Fenway Racing
WHERE HE STANDS: At 486 points, remains in first place in the Sprint Cup Series for the 11th consecutive week. Leads Roush Fenway Racing teammate and second-ranked Matt Kenseth by just 1 point, Biffle's smallest lead since he assumed the Cup series points edge, and third-ranked Dale Earnhardt Jr. by 10 points.
POCONO RECORD: 18 career starts, 1 win, 2 top-5s, 4 top-10s, 0 poles. Best career finish: 1st, summer 2010. Finished 27th in this race last season but improved to 8th in the fall race.
LOOKING AHEAD: Although he has completed all but nine laps in the 18 starts he has had there, Biffle has not had the greatest success at Pocono. He typically starts strong but often fades as the race goes on. He has led just 92 laps in his career at the 2.5-mile tri-oval. His success has been sporadic as well. For example, in the last four races, he has finished 28th, 1st, 27th and 8th. Biffle admits the new surface at Pocono has him worried, not to mention a shorter race (400 miles instead of the longtime standard of 500 miles): "I'm nervous heading to Pocono because I have no idea what to expect. We have a day and a half of testing, which is good, but I have no idea how fast it will be or how different it will drive through the corners. I'm excited it was repaved and also think that the race being shortened to 400 miles will create some excitement with the fans. There will be more urgency to go and different strategy during the race. I'm pretty anxious to get there and get on the track."
LOOKING BACK: Although he has a decent record at Dover, things didn't look good for a while on Sunday. But to both the credit of Biffle and his team, the No. 16 battled back from what looked as if it would be one of their worst finishes of the season to rebound to a decent 11th-place showing, allowing Biffle to remain atop the standings, albeit by just one point.
ETC.: Biffle has completed nearly 100 percent of the 3,514 laps -- he has scored 3,505 laps, a 99.7 percent completion average -- contested over his 18 starts there. He has an average start of 18.7 and an average finish of 17.2. He also has 2 DNFs.
17 MATT KENSETH, Ford
Team: Roush Fenway Racing
WHERE HE STANDS: This year's Daytona 500 winner has been in second place for the last four weeks. He is just 1 point behind Roush Fenway Racing teammate and series points leader Greg Biffle and 9 points ahead of third-ranked Dale Earnhardt Jr.
POCONO RECORD: 24 career starts, 0 wins, 3 top-5s, 9 top-10s, 0 poles. Best career finish: 3rd in spring 2003 race. Finished 8th in this race last year but fell to 16th in the fall race.
LOOKING AHEAD: While he runs fairly consistently at Pocono, Kenseth still has yet to win there. Although he finished 8th in this race last season, he's struggled of late, and six of his last seven finishes have been outside the top-10. Sunday will mark his 25th career start at the 2.5-mile tri-oval. Here's Kenseth's take on racing at Pocono: "I don't know a lot about Pocono since they repaved it, but since we have to be there for testing next week, I think by the time we do the test, we'll have a good idea of what you need and a good plan going into Friday and getting ready for the weekend. It is a bit of an unknown right now, and until we get on the track, having not been on that surface yet with a tire on that new surface it is hard to predict how much tires are going to make a difference compared to track position and all those variables. I would assume with it being a new paved track that we'll have a fairly hard tire and be more focused on track position and fuel mileage than on tires."
LOOKING BACK: Kenseth continued his strong run of late at Dover, finishing 3rd. Although he mounted a challenge to eventual winner Jimmie Johnson, Kenseth's Ford just didn't have quite the power that the Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolets had.
Comments