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NASCAR Sprint-Cup Series
CUP: Raising Kahne/Chase Notebook
Kasey Kahne is looking for answers with the latest RPM merger...
Tom Jensen  |  Posted September 18, 2009   Loudon, NH
Kasey Kahne is carrying a lot of uncertainty into the 2009 NASCAR Chase for the Sprint Cup. (Photo: LAT Photographic)

KAHNE KEPT KLUELESS — Kasey Kahne is glad to be back in the Chase for the Sprint Cup, but on Friday he admitted he’s not sure what’s going on in the leadership ranks of Richard Petty Motorsports, which is in the process of taking over Yates Racing and switching to Fords for 2010.

RPM formally confirmed Friday that former competition director Mark McArdle had left the team and Kahne said he’s not sure who’s running things now — not a good state of affairs as the Chase begins.

Asked who the decision maker at the team is now, Kahne said: “Well, that’s a tough question because I really don’t know who it is, either. So, I don’t know. There are not a lot of answers out there right now. I don’t know if it’s because we’re in the middle of a lot of things, we just don’t have a person in that position. I think Robbie Loomis is supposedly going to be that guy, but I don’t think that he is yet.”

And Kahne was just warming up. “Is it Foster (Gillett, son of team majority owner George Gillett)? You can’t get anything out of Foster,” said Kahne. “So it’s hard to say who that is and I think that’s because we’re in a lot of different things right now, but when you’re in things, you still need to keep your team and your guys, your company behind you knowing what’s going on and we don’t have that. Hopefully, we get it soon. The sooner we get that, the better everybody will be.”

Kahne allowed as how he’s a big fan of his crew chief, Kenny Francis. “As far as the rest of the company, I think they’re trying to build it and make it better. That’s their ultimate goal,” he said. “So it’s difficult to see the paths that they’re taking and how it’s all working out and if it’s the right way or wrong way, I don’t know. That’s one thing that, over this last couple weeks, I think our team has just tried to stay out of it and just do our thing. We’ll find out soon enough I guess on what happens next.”

BIFF CHASES HISTORY — While much has been made about Jimmie Johnson’s pursuit of history and a fourth consecutive NASCAR Sprint Cup championship, Greg Biffle is after a piece of history himself. Biffle is trying to become the first driver to ever win championships in all three of NASCAR’s top divisions.

Biffle, more than anyone else in the field, knows how little the Chase can hinge on. In 2005, a dropped lugnut on a pit stop at Texas Motor Speedway cost him dearly, as he finished the Chase 35 points behind eventual champion Tony Stewart. That one mistake was the difference between having a prominent spot in the NASCAR record book, and being thought of as just one of many very good drivers.

“It’s really tough to deal with those things,” said Biffle, who was 19th in Friday’s opening round of practice for the Sylvania 300 at New Hampshire Motor Speedway. “Dumb things can happen and people can make simple mistakes. You can make huge mistakes, but the reality is you’ve got to deal with it and go on. When it happens, you have to try and recover the best you can from it. You’ve got 10 weeks to have to be flawless and every one of us know that, so all of us have prepared the best we can to make 10 perfect weeks.”

That’s not always easy, Biffle admitted. “It’s tough to deal with,” he said. “It really, really, truly is tough to deal with when something like that happens, and you never know if that’s gonna be the deciding factor until you’re down to the very last race. That lugnut deal happened (with) three (races) to go, we were running third and finished 20th and lost the Chase by 35 points. With pretty quick math you can tell I lost 50 or 60 (points) from that one incident. … Tony easily could have had something happen at Homestead and we could have won it, so you never give up.”


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