And that big last lap Shootout crash? Well, here's Jeff Gordon's Take

  Not everyone had as good a night as Shootout winner Kevin Harvick. Here Carl Edwards (99), who dominated much of the race, hits the skids....(Photo: Getty Images for NASCAR)
  

   By Mike Mulhern
   mikemulhern.net

    DAYTONA BEACH, Fla.
    So the first few days of SpeedWeeks have been a little, well, weird. And when Jeff Gordon slammed into Greg Biffle in the final moments of Saturday night's Bud Shootout, triggering a big crash for which NASCAR – on a very slow call – finally threw a caution, well, it just added to the aura of strangeness here.
    "Oh, man, it was just a green-white-checkered flag race," Gordon said after that race-ending crash.
    "We got a great run down the back straightaway. Matt Kenseth was pushing me. I got to Greg (who was running on worn tires), and I was just pushing and pushing and pushing...almost had to move to the inside of him.
    "Then he kind of closed the door....and I was just pushing.
     "We went into the corner, and he just spun right out.
     "I don't know if he had a tire go down, or if it was just that he was on old tires and couldn't take that kind of a push.
     "They said that bump-drafting is okay now -- so that's what it's going to take to win the race.
     "He was thanking me for the push, and I was trying to push him up there to win the race or finish right there behind him anyway.
    "I just had so many guys stacked up behind me, pushing me, and I was just pushing him.
    "It's hard to say really, in that situation, without seeing it on camera, whether he had a tire going down or not.
    "He made it through turns one and two okay, and we were pushing him real, real hard.
    "And the fact that they stayed out of there on old tires was definitely going to make his car not handle quite as good.
    "At that point you don't have a choice -- They're pushing you, and you're pushing the guy in front of you, and when that's the situation, you hope that in Greg's position that you get in there and the car sticks. And in that situation it didn't stick, for whatever reason.
     "It came around in a hurry, that's for sure.
      "I was wanting to push him, I wasn't wanting to spin him.
     "I hit him real hard one time, and it made him go up the track down the straightaway and I almost got to the inside of him.
     "If I could have done that, I think we might have had a shot at the win."
      But the 150s Thursday should be a little more cautiously paced, Gordon says.
      "I think guys are going to be a little smarter," Gordon said. "That's your 500 car.
     "You can't really do much bump-drafting in here at Daytona.
     "You can do it down the straightaways, on a two-or-three lap shootout like that. So I would think if there's a caution with a few laps to go, you'll see it.
    "Once we get to the 500, that's a totally different deal.
     "Man, it's the Daytona 500, and everybody is going to be going for it, and you're going to see a lot more risk being taken, and for good reason.
      "You'll see plenty of action and plenty of bump-drafting."
     The larger restrictor plate provided drivers with maybe another 12 to 15 horsepower, a little more acceleration. "The cars were pretty out of control, which was fun at times," Gordon said. "You had to really drive them.
    "But we've got to get our car handling maybe a little bit better."

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