have said and some credentialed writers are actually writing about it. Remember folks, just because its bad press doesn’t mean that NA$CAR doesn’t like it. Its media exposure, which is something that NA$CAR craves. As one Hollywood actress said many years ago, “I don’t care what you say about me as long as you spell my name right”.
Don Coble came up with these little tidbits that I find very interesting:
Last Dec. 8, NASCAR released a list of substances that would be tested, in reaction to Aaron Fike's admission he used heroin while he was a driver in the truck and Nationwide series. That list includes seven different amphetamines, including methamphetamine; three ephedrines; 13 different narcotics, including codeine and morphine; 10 different benzodiazepines and barbiturates; and marijuana, cocaine, zolpidem, nitrites, chromates and drugs that can increase specific gravity. The sanctioning body, however, also reserves the right to suspend people for substances not on the list.
Now if Don Coble has this list, why don’t the drivers?
I find this interesting too : The sanctioning body, however, also reserves the right to suspend people for substances not on the list.
Does this mean that His Royal Highness could be suspended for destroying the traditions of the sport? Could he be suspended for being greedy? Or how about a demonstrated lack of common sense? After all, we know he wouldn’t be suspended for the “sodas” he likes to spill in his Palm Tree Assault Vehicle (PTAV). But anyone could be suspended for alcohol even though the human body produces it naturally in small amounts. Would a driver or crewmember be suspended if nicotine should happen to turn up? How about glucose? The problem is that NA$CAR can pick and choose what they like or don’t like that’s not on this list. So even if you came up positive for a legal substance, just because His Majesty doesn’t like it on a particular day (like Pamprin when he’s not PMS-ing) means anyone who tested positive for a legal substance could be suspended.
Now we get down to the crux of it. If it was Claritin D, which caused the problem and it’s not on the list, will it become a banned substance or will it become something else like the infamous “actions detrimental to stock car racing” subject to your whim and whimsy? Or will Claritin’s sponsorship provide it a certain amount of “protection” from being totally banned or made a suspect substance? Like the old saying goes, “Money talks”. Claritin will be protected.
"What is important to note about our list, which we have, or any other list: We don't want to make it selective, either," France said. "It's not exclusive to that list. There are things in the scientific world that are changing all the time."
I bet he got a headache from that statement. Too many multi-syllable words in it. No kidding things are changing in the scientific community all the time. People are also changing all the time. Like the ones who change their Depends, unlike you Your Highness. Folks are finding new ways to beat the system and others are trying to find new ways to detect what’s beating the system. Except NA$CAR. They still can’t figure out who’s running traction control and who’s not. Folks have found ways to mask illegal substances and others are finding ways to detect them. So let’s say caffeine becomes a substance of interest because it improves somebody’s performance, will the energy drinks be banned? Will coffee and tea be banned? Or how about sodas? The whole reason coffee was introduced into the work place was to keep typist typing and make them more productive. So caffeine is a performance enhancing drug. Will it be banned because it’s surely not on the list? Will a driver be banned for it because it’s a performance enhancing drug that’s not on your list? Your list of what’s not on the list will be as selective as your enforcement of the rules regarding racing.
One article I read said that NA$CAR would never go out of its way to ruin a driver’s career. Exhibit A: Tim Flock. Tim was banned for life by Bill France Sr. for belonging to the drivers union that Curtis Turner formed. Tim never returned to NA$CAR and never had the same success after being banned. Exhibit B: Tim Richmond. I hate to keep bringing his name up but because of the medications he was taking for AIDS and wanting to keep it private and NA$CAR suspending him until he produced his medical records, they ruined his racing career. Now here’s something that wasn’t life ruining but didn’t exactly help out either. And that’s the case of Wendell Scott. NA$CAR went out of its way to keep Wendell from finding sponsorship and getting factory support. Despite this, he managed to finish in the Top 10 several seasons in a row. Just imagine if he’d had decent sponsorship and factory backing what he might have done. So to say NA$CAR would never ruin a driver’s career makes me think somebody has been sipping the official purple Kool Aid in heavy doses.
Back to the problems with our disabled/handicapped fans and problems they have at the track. I got a couple of e-mails from some folks who have had problems at some tracks and it goes a ways towards giving I$C a black eye as not being fan friendly versus Burton’s tracks:
I may be the fan you wrote about who complained about Darlington. My husband will only go with me to Richmond (he is scheduled to hip replacement surgery 6/1) because of its elevators and escalators. I went with a friend who has had 4 leg operations for complications following surgery for a broken leg, including contracting MERSA. She was 8 weeks out of a wheelchair and we walked easily a couple of miles because handicapped parking was closed (they were letting cars into it when we walked past it) The whole experience was a nightmare: including the fact the I could not walk against the tide of humanity to get my husband his Shrub hat for father's day. The thing is we could have parked directly across from the track for $20.00 and would have if we had known about the parking situation. What would it have taken to have a big blinking sign saying "Handicapped Parking Filled." We asked a yellow shirted staff member where Pearson Tower was and were directed up a gazillion steps, so we went up all the steps only to find out that we were in Tyler Tower and that it was not connected to Pearson Tower. We did see a woman in a wheelchair and she directed us to an unmarked elevator on a back corner that we took to back were we started. We walked to Pearson Tower and up the steps again to our seats. Thank god it was hot and we were perspiring a lot because if I would have had to use the facilities, I would have never gotten back to my seat and missed some good racing and pit stops. we were directly opposite JR's pit and for JR fans that is hog heaven. We were surrounded by a lot of people from Michigan, New York and Illinois and all of them were complaining about the "crappy" facilities. I doubt they will sell a lot of repeat tickets to those people. I hate not going to Darlington because it is good racing and only 45 minutes from home, but the track is sooooooo fan unfriendly.
Not exactly a ringing endorsement. Here's another one regarding Phoenix:
Be sure to add Phoenix International to you list of unfriendly tracks for the disabled. In fact, I think you could add it to the unfriendly for everyone. I went once, never again. Texas Motor Speedway and Kansas City are the most friendly and the most helpful for the disabled. Like Smith or not, his track are friendly even if they are boring. NASCAR is crying about ratings dropping - I have one suggestion - listen to the fans, the people who support the races.
First impressions are often lasting impressions and the Emperor of All Things NA$CAR wonders why he can’t get repeat business or fill up the grandstands. These are two examples of why. I know there are a lot of other fans out there who are disabled or handicapped and their money spends just as good as anybody else’s. So they’re voting with their wallets. If Faux King Brian and his henchmen don’t get a clue real soon, they’ll be facing some serious financial problems as well as some potential lawsuits from the disabled/handicapped race fans. Don’t say I didn’t warn you, Your Highness.
The All Star Race’s TV ratings were down 2% from last year. I think that’s the only race so far this season which has been down single digits. Not too shabby considering it was on Speed and Speed isn’t available to everybody. Still, with NA$CAR trying to figure out why the ratings continue to plunge, you have to wonder if they even watch the same races we do at home. What they call exciting in their official propaganda sheets put the home audience asleep. Note to NA$CAR, maybe it’s your insistence that they only cover what His Royal Highness says will be covered, the cheerleading, the boring results of the COT (which is what some people sleep on), and constant shilling and commercials that are causing the ratings to drop so badly. Maybe if you showed all 43 participants, had something that actually resembled it’s street counterpart racing, got rid of the rampant commercialism and constant shilling, and put an end to the cheerleading, maybe, just maybe, your ratings would go back up some. Your track attendance might even go back up too. But what do I know? I’m just a race fan. And after all, didn’t the Emperor of All Things NA$CAR say he knows what’s best for the sport? If this is the best, I’d hate to see the worst.
Jeffy Boy had his back procedure done and if it works the way it’s supposed to, he should feel some relief for a couple of months. Providing he doesn’t have any more wrecks which jar his spinal column. It took major surgery to take care of Mark Martin’s back problems. If you’re not familiar with serious back problems, surgery is the very last option in getting pain relief and there’s no guarantee it’ll work 100% of the time. Mark Martin’s back hurt him so badly that he had to be helped into and out of his car by his crew until he finally had back surgery during the off season several years ago.
The way this Dr. Black keeps going on about telling Mayfield what the drug was and Mayfield saying he hasn’t been told either orally or in writing, you have to wonder if Dr. Black has even been talking to the right Mayfield. I don’t think it’s the same Mayfield who owns Mayfield Creameries there Dr. Black. Better check your listings and phone numbers.
Having read a few comments about HRH’s State of the Sport address, you have to wonder if maybe he was “under the influence” of a foreign substance. No connected thoughts, statements that weren’t backed by fact, and a speech delivery that makes speech coaches and professional speakers want to crawl under a rock in embarrassment that it was presented as a speech. The best comment came from one of our long time readers who summed up His Majesty’s speech in three simple words. Bovine Fecal Matter. Keep the hip waders on folks, we’ve still got a long season ahead of us and more official edicts to come.
The folks in Washington DC keep telling us hybrids are the way to go. Well, this might explain why this hybrid gets such good gas mileage: jalopnik.com/5261006/toyota
Congratulations to John Andretti on making the Indy 500 on Bump Day. Stanton Barrett on the other hand got bumped. One of the problems facing the IRL is that Dallara, the manufacturer of the bodies used by all the teams, hasn’t made any new molds or produced any new bodies in a number of years. This leaves the IRL teams having to “dumpster dive” to find replacement body parts. Unless Dallara produces some new molds and cranks out some new bodies or a new supplier for the car bodies are found, it could be a very tough season for all the teams. Another thing with the IRL is that every single car in the field for the Indy 500 will be running Honda engines. This might also explain why Honda dropped out of Formula 1. A lot of money spent and nothing to show for it in economic times which require some results. No matter who wins the Indy 500, Honda wins.
For you folks who enjoy muscle cars and all the joy they bring and the ego stimulation and adrenaline rush that go with them, you better buy them now before the 2012 CAFÉ Standards kick in. With the new standards, 35.5 mpg is the law for cars and I can’t really see many of the new muscle cars getting that. Apparently the California green faction is leading the way with this movement in Washington DC and where California goes, the nation will follow. This might explain a few other problems the nation is having but that’s for a different day. And with this, you have to wonder how it will affect racing in general and NA$CAR in particular. Will they finally be forced to move to fuel injection? How can you race hybrids with a carburetor? Will traction control become mandatory so everyone gets better gas mileage? Will drivers be able to pedal their cars faster? What will be the mandated gears and bicycle chain length? Will Goopher be the new source of power by running on a treadmill? What about squirrels and other rodents?
“Today, Hendrick Motorsports announced that
their new Chevy Chevettes will be powered by
chinchillas. This caused an uproar with the
Japanese automakers claiming it gave the
Chevies an unfair advantage. After stuffing a
couple of chinchillas inside his Depends, His
Majesty, the Emperor of All Things NA$CAR,
said they felt good and tickled him a great deal
and he didn’t see any problems with the
chinchilla powered Chevettes. Rumors of Ford
using flying squirrels appear to be unfounded.
Apparently this rumor was started by a
disgruntled driver from one of the Japanese
automakers teams who mistook a Rocky and
Bullwinkle cartoon as a training film for the Ford
teams. The driver who made the accusation could not be reached for comment at his poolside cabana but was seen running down a country road barefooted after rolling another SUV. In other racing related news, drunken male race fans were sorely disappointed when they went to see 100 Tatas lined up in the Talladega infield. The Tatas in question weren’t those of female race fans or Playboy bunnies but were in fact 100 Tata Nanos. Several fans were arrested for trying to play with the cars like Hot Wheels and one fan was arrested for trying to walk away with a Tata under each arm to take home for his kids to play with.”
Another one of those stories that didn’t make the evening news is that US military personnel while in the Philippines for a joint exercise with the host country’s army helped to provide medical care and assistance to Philippine nationals who were unable to seek medical care. Of course, as usual, the mainstream media missed this one because not only wasn’t it in a combat zone but it shows that our military folks are doing something good to help out people who would otherwise suffer from the lack of decent medical care. So two thumbs up to the folks in the Pacific Command for being humanitarians.
Need a place to camp at Charlotte? Call Stephanie 980-621-7986 - Easy walk to turn 1/2.
Hudspeth Family Campground, The Official Charlotte Campground of Laidback Racing Mention Laidback Racing and get a discount on dry camping! RACE DAY PARKING AVAILABLE.
Motherhood, Apple Pie, and John Wayne
Mad Mikie, Curmudgeon at Large
Gotta comment, question or want to say hey there...email Mike here
Want to chat with other race fans about this article and other NASCAR stuff?
Go visit our home page, called appropriately The Pits & check out our photos & pages. Our most popular page; Race Recon is where you get all the info you need to go to the races including local camping, hotels, bars, restaurants, tracks, golf & other important race weekend information. We also have attending a NASCAR Race tips, tailgating tips & recipes, stories, trivia, quotes & more! While you are surfing see if you are a REAL RACE FAN. Be sure to read the Fan Fables, LAIDBACK RACING’S adventures with the tailgating race fan at NASCAR tracks.
