Conspiracy theorists are everywhere in the world of NASCAR. Dale Earnhardt Jr is the most conspired against person who never appeared in an X-files episode.
It's always something isn't it? In the past, his step mom was scheming to keep his much loved number - Eight-gate. Lately with eight (there's that number again) DEI engine failures in his Bud Chevy , rumblings of Engine-gate have been common. When a wheel came off of his car Sunday at Atlanta Motor Speedway, the blanket, Theresa-gate is what most of Junior Nation probably thought.
But it looks like Earnhardt and the DEI folks are out of the latest weirdness in the kingdom of France. Water-gate. Denny Hamlin apparently ran out of fuel as he led the field to the final re-start. He claims it was due to water in his fuel.
"All day we'd been getting water in our fuel," Hamlin said. "The water displaces fuel and so we weren't getting the full potential of fuel. We just took it apart again and pulled some gas out of the fuel cell and once again, we got water.
How about this quote from the Dave Blaney's camp - thanks to Lee Spenser:
"We didn't know what was going on (with the engine)," said Blaney's crew chief, Tommy Baldwin. "We drained (the fuel cell) and it was half water, half fuel. I'm guessing maybe it was because we were one of the first ones, us and (Hamlin), to get fuel this morning."
Even NASCAR's John Darby is getting Gate-shy, I guess.
"There's no reason to think about conspiracy, going back to the fact you have a Chevrolet team and a Toyota team. There's no connection there that would make anybody think of some evil spirit trying to sabotage somebody's race car."
Oh really? So, where were Ray Everham and Jack Roush on the night of October 27, 2007, huh?
Just to have some fun here...is there a coverup going on to pull Sunoco's foot out of the doo doo pile...:)
Posted by: robert bourne | October 29, 2007 at 05:22 PM
I probably shouldn't say this since it will only add water to the fuel, but Hamlin drives for Gibbs who is essentially a lame duck Chevy team, switching to Toyota in '08. Again, I'm not saying anything other than pointing out that Darby's excuse is lame.
Posted by: mike | October 29, 2007 at 06:59 PM
Never!
NEVER, John Darby, NEVER will I EVER give up my foil hat.
You'll have to yank my foil hat from my cold, bald and DEAD pate!
Posted by: marc | October 29, 2007 at 10:16 PM
Robert, there certainly was some of that going on Sunday night.
Mike, I went back and read what Darby said - then I read what you said again. I think that Chevy watered the gas to make - follow me here - Toyota in general, Gibbs in particular and also all Ford and Dodge teams (as possible conspirators) look bad! How's that for your foil hat Marc?!
I need a drink. Scotch. Neat.
Posted by: Charlie | October 29, 2007 at 10:35 PM
"I need a drink. Scotch. Neat."
You need more than one after concocting that story.
Posted by: marc | October 30, 2007 at 02:24 AM
It was Vita-water in the fuel cells.
Now, to debunk the GM theory--they wouldn't want to hurt their reputation by making their own engines look bad, would they?
Oops, forgot about RCR/DEI--I read that Teresa made a deal with GM to give them all bad RO7 engines so her sabotage against Jr wouldn't be so obvious at Talladega.
Posted by: RevJim | October 30, 2007 at 05:26 AM
The real coverup here is that Cesar Romero, Burgess Meredith, Frank Gorshen and Julie Newmar were all on Rick Hendrick's pass list. After all, Hendrick is out to steal NASCAR from the France family.
Posted by: Steve | October 30, 2007 at 06:40 AM
It's voodoo that's causing all this weirdness!
Posted by: vroom | October 30, 2007 at 07:18 AM