FORD FIGHTS BACK; Slowly but surely, the Blue Oval claws its way to the front.(Competition)

Byline: AL PEARCE

At this time last year, Ford's four NASCAR teams had one Cup Series win and one driver in the top 12 in points. The Fusion-racing teams had combined for 10 top-fives and 19 top-10s through last May's race at Richmond. Through Richmond this season, three Ford teams have combined for three wins, nine top-fives and 21 top-10s and have two top-12 drivers. The rally is small, perhaps, but a rally just the same.

"We've won 33 percent of the races [from Dover in September last year until Richmond this year], and that's pretty darned successful,'' said Doug Hervey, North American director of Ford Racing. "Admittedly, our teams were behind with the [Car of Tomorrow] last year. So we sponsored tests [at Milwaukee, Nashville, Iowa, Kentucky and Virginia], and our computer-simulation guys worked closely with Jack Roush's guys to figure it out. They came up with some good ideas that correlated to track results. Now we're seeing the results of those track tests and simulations.''

Matt Kenseth won for Ford in February 2007, but it wasn't until Carl Edwards at Michigan in June that Ford got its second Cup win of the season.

The manufacturer ended '07 with seven wins (six in the summer and fall) spread among Kenseth, Edwards, Greg Biffle and Jamie McMurray. So far this year, Edwards has Ford's three wins; he and Biffle are in the top 12 in points.

"The improvement is because of the organization at Roush Fenway Racing, the way we're focusing our energy and efforts on engineering and testing,'' said Edwards, Ford's biggest star. "Instead of putting it off and off, we now believe we're going to make this Car of Tomorrow better. As long as we keep that mentality, we'll be really good. It's better organization and cooperation that have made our cars stellar since midway through last season. I'm really impressed with the job [ex-crew chief] Robbie Reiser is doing as general manager.''

Roush and, by association, Ford Racing were caught flat-footed last spring by the COT. Roush had played nice and had not backdoor-tested his new cars, trusting other owners to follow NASCAR's rules. By the time he learned that was not happening, Ford's four teams (three this year) were well behind.