Full Throttle

Rather than bore you with another long-winded treatise on one subject or another the Half-Vast Staff™ of Full Throttle will take this opportunity to highlight a few of the NASCAR related topics that have crossed our desk in the last few hours.

Heading the list is the ESPN Magazine’s claim that Jeremy Mayfield’s positive drug test was the result of his use of methamphetamine. They cite two independent sources both of which are outside the chains of command of NASCAR and the testing facility Aegis Labs.

Take that for what’s it’s worth, obviously whether true or not someone, somewhere is leaking the information.

The included video is Dr. Wadler of the World Anti-doping Agency (WADA) who describes the effect of methamphetamine usage and is very critical of NASCAR’s lack of a published banned drug list, something I’ve noted early on. (see April 2008 and Sept 2008)

That said, WADA isn’t without some controversy arising from it policies as well, again, for what it’s worth.

Turning to Richard Petty Motor Sports, there’s a new poll on FT’s front page that asks about the future of the organization. At this point, who knows least of all officials of the team. Several team members have been laid-off this week and Petty recently stated the cash flow from Dodge as reached the trickle stage if not stopped entirely.

My guess is, and it’s purely speculation, if Petty survives they will be in a Toyota come the 2010 Daytona 500. And won’t that raise the hackles of “old-timers,” traditionalists” and “xenophobes” far and wide?

Anyone use TNT’s Race Buddy feature this past weekend? I know Thunder Lounge compatriot Clance’ did but I believe she’s the only NASCAR bloggers that did.

TNT as part of the Race Buddy feature experimented with letting users log in and chat to each other using Facebook, MySpace and Twitter while watching the Pocono 500, on Turner’s home site.

Turner’s results showed Facebook came out on top in both instances, but MySpace users messaged each other more. Twitter trailed the others in both traffic and information-sharing.

I think I may know why Twitter trailed the other two networks.

The site asks you to log into one of the three to chat on Race Buddy. I selected Twitter because I was already monitoring the service during the event.

The first message I sent was displayed on Twitter as being sent via Race Buddy. Because that entry wasn’t related to anything posted on Twitter I switched the Race Buddy chat function to Facebook so further posts wouldn’t clutter up Twitter with superfluous BS.

Whether that was a concern to others I have no way of knowing, maybe there are more NASCAR fans on Facebook than Twitter, my personal observation is just that, personal and very limited.

Will people quit bunching-up their boxers and panties over the length of NASCAR events!

Nothing’s changed from 10, 20, or even thirty years ago. How many complaints were heard about race lengths during “The Great Run-up” of NASCAR popularity during the mid-eighties through the turn of the new millennium?

Without researching it I’d say damn few if any. Nothing has changed except society and a population that seems to want everything handed to them on a silver platter and done so within the next 10 minutes, if not sooner.

Do you believe in Karma, or good and bad luck charms?

If so I ask you what will be the result of naming Detroit Lions new Head Coach Jim Schwartz as Honorary Starter for Sunday’s LifeLock 400 at MIS?

Sorry to bring it up Charlie, but isn’t it tempting fate by having your starter also the head honcho of the NFL’s historic loser? (0-16!) BTW, I think Charlie has pin-pointed Dale Jr’s pitstop problems this year.

And finally, I think I’ve discovered a way to mute the Kyle Busch Boo-Birds for at least one event.

For example at either the fall Bristol or Talladega events name current Hollywood Hottie Megan Fox as Honorary Race Marshal.

When touring the track from the back seat of the Pace Car broadcast the following Megan Fox quote given in response to the question: “What would you ask Megatron to keep him from destroying the world?”

“I’d barter with him, and say instead of the entire planet, can you just take out all of the white trash, hillbilly, anti-gay, super bible-beating people in Middle America?”

If that isn’t throwing red meat to the lions I don’t know what would be and should quiet a few if not all the Busch Boo-Birds.