Roush needs to regroup quickly as Chase hits J.J.'s territory

CONCORD, N.C. -- If you're going to make it as a top-notch NASCAR driver, one tool that is a necessity is a short memory.

Harboring anger or bad feelings from a previous race won't help a driver when he straps on his helmet the following weekend. Which is why Roush Fenway teammates Carl Edwards, Greg Biffle and Matt Kenseth are trying to put last Sunday's late-race pileup at Talladega in their rear view mirrors.

Edwards started the massive chain reaction mess when he tried to bump draft Biffle through Turns 3 and 4. But instead of moving the duo to the front of the field as the tactic is meant to do, it backfired into a skidding mess that involved 12 drivers, three of them from the Roush stable.

Edwards took full blame for it and his teammates have accepted the apology and everyone from Roush has moved on.

"He understands that he made a mistake and there's nothing we can do about that now. I didn't understand at first what had happened," said Biffle, who lost 67 points to Chase leader Jimmie Johnson in the aftermath.

"We had been bump drafting –- not Carl and I -– but we had been bump drafting in the corners a little bit throughout the race, which, done properly, hadn't been a problem all day. You've got to be real careful about it, so I had a real problem understanding what happened and why the car turned sideways like it did –- so fast that I didn't have any time to react whatsoever. I went back and once I watched the tape, then it was clear what exactly happened."

While Biffle understood what caused the wreck, Kenseth wasn't as forgiving –- at first.

With success at intermediate tracks, Carl Edwards likes his chances at LMS. (AP)

"I think that Matt probably took it a little bit harder than I did because Matt was an innocent bystander in that thing and got caught up in it, and he's had a rough start to the Chase," said Biffle. "But I think all of us are hard drivers and we understand that we're gonna have problems in these close quarters."

Kenseth and Edwards have had a testy relationship at times in their Roush tenure, but once things settled down this week the 2003 champion was ready to look ahead.

"Our relationship is fine," Kenseth said. "I was disappointed there was a wreck, but you knew there would be wrecks and some of that stuff is gonna happen. I was disappointed it happened because we were almost out of contention and I thought we were gonna have a good day and gain some points ... then we got wiped out."

Although his teammates have made peace, others in the garage -- including Kevin Harvick, also caught up in the Talladega melee -- aren't as forgiving and have accused Edwards of rough driving the last several weeks.

Harvick and Edwards squared off Thursday at Lowe's Motor Speedway as teams were preparing for Saturday night's Bank of America 500 in the aftermath of a war of words that erupted from the Talladega crash.

While the scuffle didn't last long and NASCAR considers it a "non-issue," it was another example of the sometimes fiery Edwards' passion for what he does.

"Let me explain," Edwards said. "I go out there, and I race as hard as I can. I do everything I can, just like all these guys, and sometimes it doesn't work out the best. Really, there are going to be people that have opinions or feel a certain way, and that's just the way it is, and that's OK."

As for the Harvick altercation, Edwards declined to comment further.

"I'm just a passionate guy, and I stand up for what I think is right," he said. "That's how I am. That's how I've always been, and that's just the way I'm going to continue to be. That's how I race and I stand up for myself when I believe it."

Edwards believes he can make up some of the ground he lost to Johnson come Saturday night in Charlotte. He trails the leader by 72 points, but with four of his six wins this season coming on intermediate tracks like LMS, Edwards likes his chances this weekend.

"This is a good place," he said of the Charlotte track. "You can't knock Jimmie out. He's got some sort of magic here. It's tough, but Greg was so fast in testing, and that's the hope for all of us is that the things that Greg tested and worked for him, that we can kind of lean on that, and Bob Osborne can come up with a setup as fast.

"We'd like to have such a good run here to make up some of those points right now and not over the long haul."