Sterno

26/02/2007
FEATURE BY MIKE LAWRENCE

My sincere thanks go to the many American readers who responded to the piece about Michael Waltrip Racing's recent difficulty.

The more information that comes to light about this case, the more confused I become. Let us begin by examining the known facts. There were several Toyota Camrys entered in the Daytona 500 and only that of Michael Waltrip was thrown out. A performance enhancing adhesive gel was found coated on the inside of the inlet manifold.

The NASCAR authorities have said they will not release the identity of the additive, but I hear that it may well be an alcohol based gel made by a company called Sterno. Sterno gel has been made for more than 100 years and is used by both the food industry and in camping stoves. It is odourless, heats to a constant, high, temperature, and packs a lot of energy.

Coating the inside of a manifold with such a gel works on the same principle as one of those scented blocks you hang on the side of your lavatory bowl. Every time you flush the cistern, water runs over the block and takes some the fragrance with it. An alcohol based gel would be completely used over the course of a race and there would be nothing for scrutineers to find.

I wrote that Waltrip's fine of US$100,000 was unprecedented but, in 2000, Jeremy Mayfield copped a fine of $152,000 for tampering with fuel. Points are thrown around in NASCAR, which has 36 races in a season, so a deduction of 100 points, I am told, would be the rough equivalent of losing six points for a third place in a Grand Prix.

Those are the known facts. Guess which NASCAR driver said the following in 1976: 'If you don't cheat, you look like an idiot; if you cheat and don't get caught, you look like a hero; if you cheat and get caught, you look like a dope.

That was Darrell Waltrip, winner of 85 NASCAR races and three titles. Darrell is a commentator on TV for Fox and is Michael's older brother. Something said by someone else more than thirty years ago, though bandied about in the present case, is not evidence.

Apparently, the story made national news on all the major American TV channels whereas infringements in NASCAR would normally only rate regional news. My guess that the story made the national news because of Toyota. The background to the media interest is that the American car industry is in decline, shedding jobs and closing plants, while Toyota has just opened another new factory as is poised to become World Number One.

Waltrip's crew chief, David Hyder, who has been suspended by NASCAR, denies all knowledge of the additive. Apparently the team has offered him immunity if he shares what he knows and the sack if he doesn't; a rock and a hard place. He maintains his innocence and is currently barred from even entering the team's workshop.

Cheating is endemic in NASCAR, Waltrip's was not the only car found to infringe the rules at Daytona, but was the only one to make national news. If the team is granting Hyder immunity on the one hand, and the sack on the other, and he still protests his innocence, my hunch is to believe him.

Nobody in NASCAR has ever ceased to be a hero simply because they have been found cheating. Smokey Yanack once ran a car built to 7/8th scale, that is cheating writ large.

If you or I were in David Hyder's position, and we knew something, and all we had to do was to come clean and keep our job, most of us would come clean. If we didn't know, they could apply the thumb screws and we still wouldn't know.

The question is, who knew about the gel. Toyota pays Michael Waltrip a huge amount to run its cars. As in European Touring Cars, the safety cage is basically a spaceframe to which body panels are fixed. Toyota will have supplied parts to the team who will have subcontracted the build to a specialist. Toyota will have had little day to day involvement with Waltrip's team apart from writing the cheques. It is highly unlikely that anyone from Toyota knew about the scam.

All NASCAR teams are independently owned. They may have intimate links with a manufacturer, but they are not works teams in the European sense.

What if a rival team bribed a mechanic to apply the gel and then somehow brought it to the attention of the scrutineers. Toyota was making its debut in the Nextel Cup and is the first maker with its headquarters outside of the USA to enter NASCAR.

Toyota comes into NASCAR and the first thing that happens is that Michael Waltrip Racing generates buckets of bad publicity.

Some senior figures in NASCAR have voiced the opinion that Michael Waltrip should not have been allowed to start the Daytona 500. Officials accepted a plea that he knew nothing about the scam which begs the question of who did know and how the scrutineers found out. Sterno has been used before, it is not a secret.

What if the use of an adhesive gel was not used to gain a power advantage, but was used to discredit Toyota and/or Waltrip. It usually takes something for scrutineers to start unbolting a car.

If you cheat, you expect to gain an advantage and you don't use a method that has been known about for years. It's the sheer crudeness of the scam which worries me, you and I could use Sterno in our road cars. It smacks of those movies where the cops burst in to find a corpse and the hero with a smoking gun in his hand. He spends the next two hours on the run until he finally proves his innocence.

Michael Waltrip Racing had no need of an unfair advantage, it has its package and a sponsor which understands the sport. It was enough that the car started the race. Toyota's initial objective would have been to become the first non American company to compete in the main NASCAR series. It has been in the junior categories for some years, it knows the score, Toyota would not expect to win first time out.

I have this gut feeling that it was just a little too convenient for Toyota to be rubbished on its NASCAR debut with the whole of the US media jumping on the story. I am sure the fact that Toyota can throw money around has something to do with it, but it earns the money to throw around.

Having secured what is probably the best financial package in NASCAR, I cannot imagine why an experienced pro like Michael Waltrip would jeopardise his pension plan.

David Hyder has nothing to lose if he spills the beans, but he could be out of work if he has no beans to spill. I wonder which member of the crew doesn't like Hyder and who might benefit if he is sacked. Waltrip himself, Toyota and Hyder have all gained nothing.

If there is a scam, someone should benefit and the one team which has not benefited is Michael Waltrip Racing.

Remember the mantra… follow the money.

Mike Lawrence
mike@pitpass.com

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Picture of Michael Waltrip copyright Toyota.com

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Published: 26/02/2007
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