Roush-Fenway Racing will be a very busy place over the next 12 months.
[media-credit name=”Kirk Schroll” align=”alignright” width=”240″]
[/media-credit]From contract talks with three of their four drivers – Carl Edwards, Greg Biffle and David Ragan – to building a daycare on site. OK, so only the first part is true, but with three drivers adding to their families, it might be needed.
First, comes the business in the unpleasant nature of contract talks. With Edwards and Biffle having made the Chase and won races in the past, the two are not expected to be hard to keep in the RFR family.
It’s Ragan’s contract that could become a top story however.
While team owner Jack Roush acknowledged support for the driver and that he would like to retain him for years to come, the expectations and performance need to be there. Ragan has never won a race or qualified for the Chase, last season he finished 24th in points which is a far cry from his 13th standing in his sophomore year (2008).
It was among the many discussions last week during the preseason media tour where Roush spoke of what was ahead for his organization. Contract talk won’t be the only tasks on the agenda; RFR will be looking to keep a hold on key sponsors.
“All our sponsors agree they continue to see NASCAR as the sport that’s very important to their marketing efforts,” Roush said last Thursday.
“They see Roush-Fenway as an organization that’s a terrific investment and for good reason. For 2011, every Cup program has all new cars built. We have realigned our engineering department and we have new software to run our programs on.”
It was that same software that had Roush was very critical of the team’s performance early last year. It was outdated and inaccurate. He cited it as the reason they had fallen behind other teams and were struggling each week.
But when the turnaround happened it did so in a big way. Through the summer months the RFR that many were used to seeing had arrived on the scene – Edwards, Biffle and Kenseth finished third, fourth and fifth respectfully at Michigan in August.
When they entered the Chase they were no longer the pretenders, they were contenders again. Biffle won his second race of the season in the third race of the Chase and Edwards ended the year with back-to-back wins, ending his nearly two-year winless drought.
“I feel a lot better right now going into 2011 then I did going into 2009,” said Edwards in Homestead where he was already named the 2011 preseason championship favorite.
“That’s because I feel we have a lot of momentum and things are getting better. We have a new engine that we are working on that just keeps getting better.”
Kenseth came close to joining the victory party a few times. Had it not been for an overdriven turn one in the fall Texas race, he was half a lap away from winning his first race since February of 2009.
“I don’t know about just us but all of our cars seem to be faster,” said Kenseth. “It seems like things have been going better. It feels like we’re gaining some momentum and the cars are quicker and we’re understanding each other probably a little better.”
They will enter 2011 as one of the hottest teams in the garage. With new racecars and a new hunger, look for the Roushkateers to loudly proclaim, “We’re back.”
Even more exciting though, comes from the big news released last week. Kenseth, Edwards and Biffle will all be new fathers this season.
“I couldn’t hold back,” said Roush, who broke the news on behalf of his drivers. “Maybe I wasn’t supposed to do that.”
He went on to say, “I’m excited about it.”
Senior driver Kenseth and wife Katie will be welcome their second child, joining older sister Kaylin who was born in 2009 and older brother Ross, Kenseth’s son from a previous relationship.
The expectant due date is anytime after the season-opening Daytona 500. Kenseth even predicted that he expects Katie to go into labor the Monday following the 500.
For Edwards it will also be his second child in about a year. His wife Kate gave birth to daughter Anne before the Las Vegas race last season. The sex of Kenseth and Edward’s expectant ones weren’t revealed.
As for Biffle, he found out the day of the Roush media tour that wife Nicole would be giving birth to a little girl. It will be their first child.
He joked, “We have babies by races. I’m having a Daytona baby. Matt’s having a Phoenix baby.”
The Daytona race will be the July event, with the Biffle saying the due date is July 10. Should that date remain the same it would give Biffle even more reasons to love the month of July and Daytona.
Eight years and five days earlier Biffle celebrated his first career Sprint Cup Series victory in the July Daytona race, July 5, 2003.
“It’s a huge deal. I’m super excited about it. I just can’t wait. Part of me wishes I had done it 10 years ago, but I’m happy. If you’re in the day care business, I think a traveling day care in the NASCAR motor coach lot would be highly popular right now.”
When the day does arrive where the RFR drivers need to hang up their helmets, Jack Roush might not have to go far to find their replacements.
