DESPAIN: Carl Long On Wind Tunnel

Sprint Cup

DESPAIN: Carl Long On Wind Tunnel

Carl Long joined Dave Despain in-studio Sunday night on Wind Tunnel to discuss his recent NASCAR penalty...

SPEED Staff | Posted June 08, 2009 Charlotte, NC

Dave Despain, the popular host of Wind Tunnel on SPEED. (Image: SPEED)

Part-time NASCAR Sprint Cup Series driver Carl Long joined Dave Despain in-studio Sunday night on Wind Tunnel with Dave Despain to discuss his recent NASCAR penalty for an oversized Cup engine during NASCAR Sprint All-Star weekend. Long’s appeal was heard but the penalties, including his suspension and $200,000 fine, were upheld.

Dave Despain: You’ve been vocal in criticizing the penalty here. What do you think should have happened? Had you been NASCAR, what would you have done?
Carl Long: “Kept the engine. Some infraction but not near what we got from this deal.”

Despain: Less penalty?
Long: “Yeah, I’ve been vocal. It was an All-Star Race and in no other All-Star event in any sport does it affect the regular season, so I asked them to change the rules. That didn’t work out too well, either.”

Despain (reading NASCAR statement): Nothing has changed. There have always been severe penalties for attempting to manipulate engine, tires or fuel. Do you have any reaction to that?
Long: “Somewhat. I think that when Richard Petty won the race, he won the race when Bodine did what he did. They were in competition. This was in practice and anyone in the garage area knows my circumstances and why I’m there. The rules are written for what they are but the bottom line is it always has ‘at NASCAR’s discretion.’ There’s a few things – ‘Hey, get this fixed before you come back through tech. Fix this before next week.’ So, I was wrong by expecting to get something out of it. A rule is a rule - that’s what they said. That’s the way it’s got to be. There’s no other game in town, so what do you do?”

Despain: Richard Petty, when he won his 198th race, I think it was, with a huge motor at Charlotte, got a $35,000 fine, which was a record at the time, and they took away 104 points. So, there’s that. When you appealed it, did you think something was going to happen?
Long: “I expected a reduction. I expected the suspension to be dropped or at least the four weeks like Geoff Bodine and Junior Johnson had. I thought about a lot of things but none of them seemed to happen except the infraction got rolled over to a Sprint Cup Series rule and that was the first time I’d seen that happen.”

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