NASCAR teams had clever ways to cheat up their cars back in the day
Today, NASCAR racecars are identical from team to team. That includes the chassis as well as most of the important bolt on parts.
How did we get here? Well, this is one story that led to the current NASCAR.
For decades, NASCAR was all about innovation, ingenuity mixed in with some cheating. Teams with huge budgets could test, design parts and find those advantages.
Dale Earnhardt Sr used nitrous to qualify for his first NASCAR race
And as many in the industry have said, ‘There’s not a car on the grid that’s legal.’ It’s just a matter of NASCAR finding the illegal parts.
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Dale Earnhardt Jr made his first start at Martinsville Speedway in April 2000. His first four finishes at the track were 26th, 36th, 11th and 27th.
DEI went to work. In the next five races at Martinsville, Earnhardt finished in the top-5, every time.
What changed? Here’s the behind the scenes story…
Cheating at Martinsville
“I went to Martinsville and ran into everything,” Dale Earnhardt Jr told Kenny Wallace.
“I ran into the wall, the tow truck behind the wall, everything. Tony Sr and Tony Jr, we took our car up there to go test. When we didn’t run good, they took you to work.”
“Tony Jr took a piece of tungsten and shaped it like the sprint purch on the trailing arm. The left rear sprint purch was made out of tungsten. It was like this unsprung weight that would plant the left rear tire on the ground at all times.”
“We put tungsten in the lower A-frames on the left front trying to figure out how to make this car work. We ended up learning that putting that tungsten on the trailing arm, somewhere back there at the rear-axle was the way to go.”
“We just had to disguise it to look like part of the car so that we didn’t get in trouble. Cause it was illegal.”
“We went there and ran in the top 5, six or seven races in a row.”
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Attempting to get Hendrick Motorsports to cheat the same way
In 2008, Dale Earnhardt Jr left DEI and signed with Hendrick Motorsports. When he returned to Martinsville with his new team, he asked if they could try the same thing.
“When I went over to Hendrick, they’re great at Martinsville, they won a lot of races. We go there, I’m practicing in the top-5.”
“I’m like, ‘Man, this thing’s good. I just wonder if we can get a little better. Y’all, ever put any tungsten in the left rear?’ “
“They’re looking at me like, ‘What! We don’t need that.’ “
“I didn’t mind doing a little cheating. I always wanted a little advantage from the competition. And that was the easiest way to get it.”
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NASCAR Penalties
“I’ve always said that I want NASCAR to be strict and I want penalties to be severe,” Dale Earnhardt Jr told Kenny Wallace.
“When I get caught, busted or in trouble, man it sucks. I don’t love that experience. Whether it’s a cheated up part on a racecar, a behavioral issue in the pits or a driver behind the wheel with a behavioral issue. You gotta nip it in the bud.”
“We’re not going to tip-toe up onto this. I want a deterrent right then and there that that driver will never want to experience again.”
“NASCAR, they’ve made a stand on messing with this car. It’s not going to be fun if you get caught fooling around with these parts. They’ve made that clear and I think for the most part we won’t have much to worry about in terms of teams trying to cheat.”
Early in the 2023 season, Hendrick Motorsports brought modified parts to Phoenix Raceway. NASCAR confiscated the parts, inspected them then issued the largest penalty to a team in the history of the sport.
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Behavioral penalties
“The behavioral issues like the intentional wrecking, it’s a judgement call. It’s not as clear. NASCAR has to decide, ‘Was there intent?’ They don’t want to assume or guess.”
“The behavioral issues, I think certain drivers would have been able to learn quicker not to do if NASCAR were a little more harsh. There’s a time when a driver has wrecked another driver, on purpose and nothing was done.”
“That driver really just gets away with it. And think that he can do that again next time.”
