Greg Biffle is remembered across the country not only for the kind of NASCAR driver he was, but also for the standard he set, even away from the racetrack, through his humanitarian efforts. He recently lost his life in a plane crash at Statesville Regional Airport, north of Charlotte, North Carolina, alongside his wife, Cristina, daughter Emma, son Ryder, and three others.
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Among the most memorable incidents of his life stood his Hurricane Helene relief initiative last year, an effort that reached people stranded in dangerous, hard-to-access regions. While NASCAR has not yet outlined how it plans to honor Biffle formally, a former driver believes the answer lies in action rather than ceremony.
Ryan Newman, speaking recently with Frontstretch, shared his thoughts on how the sport and its community can best pay tribute to the late driver. He urged the fraternity to embrace Biffle’s spirit of generosity that he practiced without hesitation. “The best thing and the coolest thing that we can do to honor him is to continue to pay it forward in the way that he did,” Newman said.
Reflecting on Biffle’s hurricane response, Newman recalled just how persistent his efforts were. He described Biffle as constantly on the move, flying supplies wherever they were needed, never pausing to seek attention or credit.
“The simplest story I’ve got is that I had a friend that was working with another group in the mountains, and they needed a Starlink. My friend called me and said, ‘Hey, you think you can get one of them Starlinks from Biffle?’ I called Biffle up. Biffle answered, he said, ‘Yeah, just come and pick it up.’ It wasn’t like he needed to write down the serial number or anything else. He knew, and he trusted me,” reminisced the 48-year-old.
“The amount of work that he did for those families, I don’t think you could ever decorate the humanitarianism, the level of humanitarianism that he did that was so selfless. He just did it because he knew it was the right thing to do, and it was also what he enjoyed,” he added.
Besides that, Newman also stated that Biffle genuinely loved flying helicopters, once dropping candy to children from the air simply to make them smile. During the hurricane, that same joy evolved into something far more impactful, as he chose to deliver supplies instead.
The reasoning behind Biffle’s Cessna Citation jet failing to make its return to the Statesville Airport is yet to be revealed by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), with an investigation ongoing into the incident.
