Greg Biffle

Gregory Jack Biffle was born on 23 December 1969 in Vancouver, Washington, and grew up in nearby Camas. His parents were Garland Jack Biffle II (1941 to 2016) and Sally Frye, and he had a brother, Jeffrey. The family was of German and English descent; his ancestor Johannes Buffel (1728 to 1804) came from Contwig in western Germany and settled in North Carolina. Friends recalled at his memorial that as a high school student he was suspended for doing burnouts in front of his school.

Biffle learned his trade on the short tracks of the Pacific Northwest rather than through a formal racing academy. His big break came in the nationally televised Winter Heat Series in the winter of 1995 to 1996, which he dominated. Benny Parsons, a former NASCAR champion then working as an ESPN announcer, recommended him to Jack Roush. In 1996 he entered his first Winston West races and made his first two Busch Series starts, and in 1997 he won the Most Popular Driver award in the NASCAR Northwest Series.

Truck Series: Roush Racing put Biffle in a full-time Craftsman Truck ride in 1998. He took four poles, the most by a Truck rookie, and won Rookie of the Year. In 1999 he won nine races, a single-season record until Corey Heim won 12 in 2025, and finished second by eight points. In 2000 he won the championship by 230 points over teammate Kurt Busch.

Busch Series: He was Busch Series Rookie of the Year in 2001 with five wins and won the 2002 championship with four wins and 20 top-five finishes in 34 races, becoming the first driver to take titles in both the Busch and Truck series.

Cup Series: Biffle drove the No. 16 Ford for Roush (later Roush Fenway) Racing from 2003 to 2016, winning 19 Cup races. His first was the 2003 Pepsi 400 at Daytona. In 2004 he won the Daytona 500 pole and wins at Michigan and Homestead. In 2005 he won six races, the most of any driver, including the Southern 500, and finished second in points to Tony Stewart. He won the Southern 500 again in 2006, won the first two Chase races of 2008, won at Pocono and Kansas in 2010, at Texas and Michigan in 2012, and at Michigan in 2013, Ford's 1,000th NASCAR win. In 2014 he broke Herman Beam's record for consecutive races without a DNF. After 2016 he and Roush Fenway parted ways.

Later racing: He joined NBC Sports' NASCAR America as an analyst in 2017, returned for Truck starts with Kyle Busch Motorsports in 2019 (winning at Texas) and GMS Racing in 2020, raced Stadium Super Trucks and the SRX series, drove the No. 44 for NY Racing Team in 2022, and ran part time in the ARCA Menards Series West in 2025. He founded the Sand Outlaw Series for UTV racing in 2018.

Biffle married Nicole Lunders on 17 October 2007. Their daughter Emma was born in 2011. The couple separated in early 2015 and divorced in early 2016. His son Ryder was born in 2020 to Cristina Grossu, whom Biffle married in the Bahamas on 31 December 2022. The family lived on Lake Norman in Mooresville, North Carolina.

He loved fishing, especially deep-sea fishing in Mexico, and once owned Biffle's Pub and Grill in Vancouver. In 2010 he became part-owner of Willamette Speedway in Lebanon, Oregon, and Sunset Speedway in Banks, Oregon. A licensed private pilot and helicopter pilot, he owned several aircraft over the years and was a well-known car enthusiast who owned a 2005 Ford GT and a heavily modified Shelby Mustang GT500.

After Hurricane Helene struck Western North Carolina in late September 2024, Biffle and his wife Cristina loaded his helicopter with supplies and flew repeated relief missions into isolated mountain communities, using his social media following to locate people who needed help. In one widely reported rescue he spotted a stranded man signalling with a mirror. At Easter 2025 he returned to Black Mountain to airdrop Easter eggs for local children, and in October 2025 he posted that he was trying to coordinate sea and air relief to the Caribbean after Hurricane Melissa.

Biffle was one of only a handful of drivers to win championships in both the Busch Series (now the O'Reilly Auto Parts Series) and the Truck Series, and one of the drivers to have won in all three NASCAR national series. NASCAR named him one of its 75 Greatest Drivers in 2023, and when he died the sanctioning body said he had become known for his relentless post-career humanitarian work. In 2026 all four RFK Racing cars and Kaulig Racing's No. 16 ran his number font in the Daytona 500, Niece Motorsports and Norm Benning did the same in the Truck opener, and several teams ran throwbacks to his paint schemes at Darlington. Speakers at his memorial urged mourners to "Be Like Biff".

NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series champion (2000). NASCAR Busch Series champion (2002). Truck Series Rookie of the Year (1998). Busch Series Rookie of the Year (2001). Busch Series Most Popular Driver (2002). Truck Series Most Popular Driver (2000). 19 NASCAR Cup Series wins, including the Southern 500 in 2005 and 2006. West Coast Stock Car Hall of Fame (2022). Named one of NASCAR's 75 Greatest Drivers (2023). National Motorsports Press Association Myers Brothers Award (2024) for Hurricane Helene relief. NASCAR Hall of Fame nominee (2024).

Biffle joined NBC Sports' NASCAR America as an analyst from 1 March 2017. In later years he ran his own YouTube channel, Greg Biffle - NASCAR Driver, documenting his Helene relief flights, his ranch and racing adventures, and he appeared regularly with friend Garrett Mitchell (Cleetus McFarland), including in Cleetus events in 2025.

In 2018 a jury in a civil invasion-of-privacy suit brought by his ex-wife Nicole and her mother, alleging that Biffle had placed secret cameras in his home, awarded his ex-wife $1 in compensatory damages and $500,000 in punitive damages, reduced to $250,001 because of a legal cap. In 2009 a Roush Fenway test at Texas World Speedway in which he reached 218 miles per hour was reported as a way around NASCAR's testing ban. In 2024 he said he would not drive for NY Racing Team because of unfulfilled contract obligations from 2022.

On 18 December 2025 Biffle's Cessna Citation 550 (registration N257BW) departed Statesville Regional Airport in North Carolina at about 10:06 a.m. bound for Sarasota, Florida. Soon after takeoff it turned back, and at about 10:15 a.m. it struck trees and light poles short of the runway and caught fire. All seven people aboard died: Biffle, 55; his wife Cristina; his daughter Emma, 14; his son Ryder, 5; his friend Craig Wadsworth; and pilot Dennis Dutton and his son Jack. The NTSB preliminary report said an airline transport rated pilot was flying with his son in the right seat, noted instrument problems and decreasing visibility in heavy drizzle, found no evidence of pre-impact structural separation or uncontained engine failure, and did not state a cause. A public Gathering in Remembrance was held at Bojangles Coliseum in Charlotte on 16 January 2026.