Biffle: Well, to be honest with you, Chevrolet has been ahead of us for probably the last year, or last year and a half, since 2005.

Three and four of the Chevys were a little bit ahead of us. We managed to win championships in those years as a manufacturer. But really competitive-wise they were better than us. 2005 we were better as a group. We were probably the best in 2005 as a manufacturer. And then in '06 and '07, Chevrolet is back on top, where they've been most of the time. And it's not really a surprise to us to see them running as well as they are. They've got a bunch of great teams, [Joe] Gibbs, [Rick] Hendrick, [Richard] Childress, just off the top, are very, very strong race teams.

There's only technically one of us, if you will. We have [Jack] Roush and [Robert] Yates over in the Ford camp, so if you were to say we had three Roush conglomerates all running Fords, then the tables might be balanced a little different. But they've got three strong, strong teams, three strong teams of good drivers driving Chevys, and that's something we know we have to battle.

They've been a little bit better at it, and let's face it, you take Tony Stewart, Kevin Harvick, Denny Hamlin and all those guys, and feeding a little bit of information back to Chevrolet, it'll trickle around to those teams a little bit faster. Within our organization, all we have is us. We have our five teams to gather that information and use it within ourselves. You know, it's tough to beat the odds, and the odds are there's more Chevrolet teams and better cars.

Q: How do you think the Car of Tomorrow is going?

Biffle: I think it's going to go really well. We've learned a lot about the car in the last two races. Definitely there are some things that we've picked up on, some scenarios that we've learned a little bit about and have made changes to.

I think the car is going fairly decent right now. This is going to be a big deal here to see how it turns. You know, we knew about the car a few years ago, and what we've learned last year and this year is the car doesn't turn as well as the old car. The car doesn't have the front downforce and isn't all sloped and kicked out like the regular car is.

It's a little bit harder to get it to turn around the corner, and because of that, the higher speeds here, this is going to be a place where we're going to have to work on it and working toward getting that front grip to get the car to go around the corner.

Q: What problems have you had and what concerns do you have about the COT going forward?

Biffle: Well, certainly NASCAR has been receptive to us addressing problems with it. Last week ... I took the foam to the NASCAR tech center, and NASCAR was in a fairly large meeting with all their guys about the car, and they looked at the foam. Steve Peterson came to our race shop and looked at the racecar and felt like we could have an extra heat shield and then maybe notch the foam up a little bit more around the area where the exhaust is and felt like that would address the issue.

We talked about the foam -- does it have any toxicity to it as far as when it melts or on fire? A lot of things that burn are bad to breathe in; no matter what it is, it's bad to breathe. He reassured us that that foam was OK when it smoked or whatever happened to it.

On the other hand, he said it was nonflammable, and I don't know what happened to Kevin's [car] exactly. There's another layer of board that that foam is bolted to that holds it in place. I say board, it's not a piece of wood; it's some kind of material that I can't answer. So there is an issue with the exhaust. The exhaust gets very hot in these racecars. It's hot inside.

When you think about this for a minute, people say we aren't athletes and how hot does it get inside that car? How many people ask you that, how hot does it get inside there? Well, that foam is inside the racecar. If my arm was a foot longer I could reach over and poke it with my finger, and that stuff is burning. So that's how hot it is inside that racecar for four hours, four-and-a-half hours. It's hot inside there.

Obviously, NASCAR is aggressively addressing it now. I actually have a week or two off with it, actually just one, then we go to Phoenix. They're on it, I'm sure, and we're looking at it, as well. What we can do?

But keep in mind it's not even hot yet. We're not at these hot racetracks where it's going to be hotter outside, and that's going to play a factor, as well. When it's 10, 20 degrees hotter outside, it gets hotter inside.

Q: Did you just gather stuff up and decide to go over to the R&D Center or make an appointment?

Biffle: I didn't make an appointment, I just gathered the stuff up under my arm and got the car and went over there, knocked on the door and said is Robin Pemberton in, and they said he's in a meeting. He came out and talked to me for a few minutes and said, "Why don't you come in here." I came in, and there was this conference room with like 25 people in it. You know, they were having their regular meeting, Truck Series, Busch Series, the whole thing. They wanted me in front of all those people so we could have someplace we could discuss what happened.

And part of the reason why I went over there is to talk about my car being low and figuring out what they had found, if they found anything with the car. They know that we didn't adjust any jack bolts, they know all these other things. You know, I was addressing some issues with the car.

I think that we have more things to address and work on than a quarter panel being a quarter-inch low. That doesn't matter.

Now, if it was high, certainly it would matter. I wish I would have been high. I wish it would have been the height it was supposed to be. I may have won the race. It may have given me enough advantage I could win.

I just went over there to address all the things with the car. I had never been over there before. The day I was down at the shop in our meetings, and we were talking about the car and what to do, and we're like, we've got to do something about this foam. So I just said, I'm going to go over and see if anybody is over there and if they can look at this and make some suggestions because obviously they've done a lot of work on it.

NASCAR was so receptive to that. They said thanks for coming over, I'm glad you came over. Steve Peterson came over to our shop and looked at the car and looked where it melted from and all that.

So I think that they enjoyed that interaction with us helping them resolve some issues with the car. We want it to do well. I mean, we're racing it.

Q: What are the issues about the height and the foam that you said need to be addressed coming out of that meeting?

Biffle: I guess it's a lot more technical stuff. There's something in the exhaust called a boom tube, and I think it's a pipe that equalizes the exhaust or something like that. They put that in years ago because it takes some vibration out of the exhaust pipes, and I think that exhaust pipes were breaking on these cars.

They're paying attention and being receptive to what the teams think of this car going forward.

Q: Can you explain which door, exactly what the foam looked like and from your perspective what it was like to be inside that cockpit while that foam was burning or melting?

Biffle: I didn't. I smelled some -- my foam wasn't as distorted as bad as Matt's [Kenseth] foam -- Matt's foam, I say distorted because it's a square block and it was kind of dished out like that in the middle where it had melted, and when it melted, it kind of condenses, I guess, if you will, it gets kind of smaller because it sucks together or whatever it does.

But Matt's pipes were broken. Matt's pipes were too thin and then it had a hole in it. It was blowing exhaust up inside the car or against the bottom of that tin, and that's what got the foam so hot, and I'm sure that's what happened to the 29. I've got to think that's what happened to their car.

I think with the proper heat shield and the pipes not failing that the foam is going to be OK. That's just what we made sure of going to Martinsville, that that wasn't going to be a problem. But the other thing is there's also a deal with being on the edge or having a little safety built in. Let's say you do have a problem.

I think there's still some work to be done, maybe some safety to be built in, an extra layer so that that doesn't happen. But I'm sure that that's been handled now. The thing that you have to remember, there's so many smells inside the car already. There's burning rubber and there's burning paint, there's exhaust, there's sweat, there's -- you know, there's so much to smell, and your brain is focused on not crashing, not -- you know. You're not smelling cookies cooking over there."

Q: What is the reason for the foam on the passenger side of the car? Has anybody questioned that need given the issues?

Biffle: Well, the thing about it is most of our wrecks are on the right side of the car. Most of our crashes -- we've plotted the black box where all the impacts take place -- a large percentage of the impacts are over in this category, if you will.

You know, that foam on that side is going to help absorb some energy from that impact. The other thing is it's so easy to get spun out at Talladega, Daytona, Texas, even [Richmond] and be sitting on the racetrack and have somebody hit you right square in the smacker on the right-hand side. That possibility exists easily.

Or if they go down and hit the inside wall and come back across the racetrack, man, we can T-bone them so easy. They're trying to absorb some of that energy from that impact.

Q: I just want to clarify, NASCAR told you specifically that the foam was not flammable and the smoke is safe. Would you be as comfortable if you were now warned that the material is combustible and that some labor groups list it as possibly toxic? Do you see this as a design error in the car?

Biffle: Well, I mean, logic tells me if it was flammable and it was toxic, that would be bad. I wouldn't put anybody in that situation. I mean, you know, but I'm sure all the research has shown what will burn and what won't burn.

Is it going to smoke like it did and be melting? Yes, it may do that if it gets to a certain temperature. But is it going to have open flames and fire? I don't think -- I may be mistaken and whatever else, but I didn't see any flames in the 29 [Harvick's] car. I saw a tremendous amount of smoke coming out of it, but I didn't see any flames.

So there's a fine, not really a fine line, but there's a difference between something flammable and something melting and smoke coming off of it. I think about any material you get hot enough, it's going to smoke. But if it just started flames and then just started burning, that's different.

Our firesuit will melt. You know, you throw it in a campfire, something is going to happen to it, and it's going to -- probably going to smoke. But that doesn't mean that it actually caught on fire and has flames coming off of it.

Like I said, I don't think anything is non-toxic. There's a certain amount of toxicity to any material burning.

Q: So do you feel that it's a design error that the foam is so close to the tailpipe?

Biffle: Well, you know, I'm sure most of their testing was probably done on the energy absorbent properties of the foam, and then there was a flammable test probably. I don't know, I'm just speculating. I'm in an area that I don't even know. But how do we know? I think they've had thermal couples over in that side of the racecar to know what the temperature is, also, so they've got all the proper information.

Now, did the 29 car not have the heat shield in there? Did the 29 car have the foam right on top of the exhaust pipes? Did the exhaust pipes break on the 29 car? Ours broke the week before, and we used heavier pipes. Did he brush the wall and knock them loose or something and cause ... ? There's a lot of things unanswered here that we're pointing at that foam that there could be other contributing factors.

I'm not going to say it was a design error on NASCAR's part until we do a scientific analysis of exactly what happened. Did they have the proper amount of distance air gap, did they have the heat shields in place, all those things. Because we experienced the same exact thing the week before, and we fixed it and we didn't have any problems.

Q: A lot of guys have talked about the difficulty turning these cars. Is that something on a test that you can improve on a lot, or is it just something you're going to have to learn to deal with?

Biffle: Well, a little of both. We're going to work on getting our car to turn the best we can, whatever we can do, because this car has a higher center of gravity. This car wants to roll more because it's boxier and it's taller.

We're going to try to raise and lower the front wheel centers, we're going to try different things at the front, try different front sway bars and try and do different things with rear springs.

Q: Would you say that the COT is not ready for 1.5 [-mile speedways] at this point?

Biffle: Well, you've got to remember that NASCAR has a motive for some of the things that they're doing. The car not turning as good is by design the objective. You know, they want to slow the cars down. They want to take some downforce away from the cars. They want to control some of those things.

So by design, you know, that's a math problem, if you will, that NASCAR is putting in front of all the teams. It's our job to figure it out. They've given us the procedure we have to follow, now we've got to figure it out.

You know, they're trying to make, in their eyes they're trying to make the cars more equal and make them more equal behind our cars, which you're only going to do that to a certain point. I don't care who you are or what you are or what you have; unless you take the body off the car in front completely, the car behind is still going to have some dirty air of some kind, you know, that car is going to make some kind of wake in the air. It's never going to make them equal.

I think by design NASCAR has given us what they've given us. Is the car not ready for that? I don't think so. I like the progression, the way they've done it. We're going to test it [at Richmond], we're going to race it at Phoenix, we're going to race it [at Richmond], we're going to race it at Dover. Are we going to have a lot figured out by the time we start testing the mile-and-a-halfs and start racing there? Yes, I think we are. So I think it's a good introduction to the way they've done it.

Q: Are guys thinking twice before they wreck someone [for the win] or is it unique circumstances or are they getting soft?

Biffle: Well, I have to go back and look at the history of the sport. I've been in that position a few times. I mean, I don't know what etiquette is. If you can just get to his rear bumper, do you just do it and take the win? I don't know what we're supposed to do. You know, I'll do whatever.

If you can bonsai down in the corner and wreck his a-- and go, you know, that's what I'll do, but there's going to be a lot of people outraged about that, I think. I'm just guessing.

I mean, are you going to spin Dale [Earnhardt] Jr. out for the win? Probably not. You're not going to spin your teammate out. But I'll tell you what, Jeff Gordon beat the daylights out of the back bumper of the 48 [Jimmie Johnson]. He didn't just touch him, he rammed him. He did everything he could without spinning him out, I mean literally spinning him out and wrecking him.

You know, Bristol is a lot faster, a lot faster. You can't really bump a guy and get away with it at Bristol because you're wrecking. So for [Jeff] Burton to -- he didn't touch [Kyle] Busch, but man, you couldn't have slid a piece of paper in there -- if he would have hit him like the 24 was hitting the 48 at Martinsville, that would be an instant crash.

You know, that's a big controversy. That's a big deal. I mean, it sounds cool and it would probably -- but after the fact, it's like, ooh, that wasn't good. That's what happens. You know, you're right there, you're right there, but it's like, man, the consequences of this are going to be huge.

And the other part about it is we're all professional, we're all racecar drivers. It doesn't take any ability to crash the guy in front of you. That takes no skill whatsoever. You could wreck that guy in front of you no matter what. That's easy. Anybody can do it. So that's not the thing to do.

Now, to bump the 48 like the 24 did, heck yeah, bump the daylights out of him. The rule I have is that he doesn't spin out. If you go in there and give him the nudge and he's up in the dirt trying to get a hold of it and get going again, more power to you; that's still dirty, you know. That's still dirty, but that's the way it is.

Q: How would you describe the state of NASCAR today? Is it at a high point right now?

Biffle: I would think so. I pay attention a little bit to what goes on with our sport, and it appears that it's still on the up-trend or it's kind of leveled off. Certainly you're always going to level at times throughout history and maybe go down a little bit, but I would say the health of it is very good right now. We've got lots of people watching.

The COT car has created some buzz and some excitement. Of course it's going to because there's a lot of unknowns. It would be like watching the space shuttle launch for the very first time. Everybody is going to be looking at that thing. Nobody knows what's going to happen with this new car, so a lot of people are interested in watching, and that's created some buzz.

Certainly I think we're advertising to a better audience. We're in front of a lot more people, and it's exciting racing. I go home and watch it on TiVo or my DVR, and it's exciting to watch.