NASCAR NOTEBOOK \ Martinsville, Va.

Pemberton, Darby give COT high marks: NASCAR vice president of competition Robin Pemberton gave the Car of Tomorrow an "A-minus" in its debut at Bristol. Nextel Cup Series director John Darby graded it a solid "B." "The only reason there's a minus in there is potentially a couple of problems with just the parts and pieces, whether it's tailpipes or things of that nature," Pemberton said Friday. "But that's where I'll put it." The tailpipe failures Pemberton mentioned involved pipes that were thinner than those on what is now being called the "Car of Yesterday." "If you looked at the materials that were used to construct the tailpipes on our old cars," Darby said, "they ranged probably from 83 thousandths [of an inch] in thickness to 120 thousandths in thickness, if you really wanted a robust system. "The majority of the tailpipes that failed last week were constructed of either 49 thousandths or 65 thousandths -- thin material. So I think that because the tailpipe configuration is smaller and weighs less, a lot of the teams felt like they could get by with a thinner overall material. In fact, when you apply the heat of the exhaust and everything, they did crack, and they did fail." NASCAR has increased the minimum right-side weight on the COT from 1,650 to 1,700 pounds to discourage teams from "lightening parts and drilling holes where they're not supposed to drill them and searching for exotic materials that are very expensive," according to Darby. After Greg Biffle's fifth-place No. 16 car was found to be too low during post-race inspection at Bristol, NASCAR has increased its tolerance on the minimum height of the rear of the car from one-quarter to one-half inch.
Hamlin: "Nothing broke": When Denny Hamlin's No. 11 Chevrolet faltered late in last Sunday's Food City 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway, the natural assumption was that Hamlin had experienced the same sort of fuel pump failure that had clobbered Joe Gibbs racing teammate Tony Stewart. Not so, Hamlin said Friday between practice sessions at Martinsville. Instead, it was a fuel pick-up problem exacerbated by the steep banking at BMS. "We ran out of gas, basically, with four gallons left in the tank," Hamlin said. "We're going to totally have to redesign our fuel cells, so that when we go back to a banked track, we don't have an issue. Nothing broke."
Black magic for Edwards? Carl Edwards doesn't believe in retaliating for a slight on the racetrack. This year he has a different strategy -- voodoo. "Actually, what I do if people cut me off, I've got little voodoo dolls for each guy in the car, and I've got a bunch of pins," Edwards said facetiously. "I don't resort to on-track violence. I let the black magic work, and that works for me."
Sporting News NASCAR Wire Service