HEMBREE: Bounty Hunting In NASCAR?

Sprint Cup

HEMBREE: Bounty Hunting In NASCAR?

National Football League clouded by charges of headhunting…

Mike Hembree | Posted March 09, 2012 Las Vegas, NV

SPEED.com NASCAR Editor Mike Hembree is a veteran, award-winning motorsports journalist. (File Photo)

You perhaps have noticed that the National Football League, that biggest and brightest of sports organizations, has a “touchy” problem these days.

A league investigation has revealed that members of the New Orleans Saints haven’t been. Saints, that is. Their defense has been playing under a “bounty” reward system that paid players extra cash for hits that resulted in opposing players leaving games.

This is decidedly against league regulations, obviously, and stiff penalties are expected (loss of points and a suspension of six races?).

Imagine such a system in NASCAR.

It doesn’t take a lot of imagination.

Many who were around in those days say those circumstances essentially came together in the 1956 Cup season, one in which two-time champion Herb Thomas, one of the best drivers of NASCAR’s early years, seemed on target to win his third title.

Thomas, a dirt farmer who happened upon a race one day and decided he could drive as good – or better – than those competing, began the 1956 season in his own cars but detoured midway through the year to join the Carl Kiekhaefer team. Kiekhaefer had the sport’s first “superteam,” and his Chryslers attracted top drivers.

Thomas won three times for Kiekhaefer before tiring of the travel schedule the team owner demanded, and the North Carolina driver returned to his own cars to finish the season.

With five races left on the original schedule, Thomas led the standings. Trailing were Buck Baker and Speedy Thompson, Kiekhaefer’s drivers. With the end of the year closing in and his chances at the title slipping away, Kiekhaefer signed a couple of track leases and added a couple of races to the schedule – an acceptable practice in those days.

At one of those races – in Shelby, N.C., Thompson banged into the rear of the Thomas car, sending it sailing into the outside guard rail. Following traffic piled into Thomas’ car, and, by the time track workers reached him in the junkyard of cars he was unconscious.

Thomas wound up in the hospital, where he underwent brain surgery, and Baker drove on to the championship.

The wreck essentially ended Thomas’ career. He raced a few more times after recovering but was a shadow of his former self.

It has been whispered – loudly by some – through the years that Kiekhaefer wanted Thomas “taken out” at Shelby to open the door to the championship for one of his drivers.

If true – and this sort of thing certainly has happened in many forms of racing over the years, it can be assumed that Thompson didn’t begin the crash with the idea of causing such severe injuries to Thomas. This kind of “bounty” would have involved taking out the car, not a quarterback or wide receiver.

Unfortunately, intentionally slamming into another race car at high speed can have consequences far beyond thoughts of payback or of winnowing the field of competition.

In any case, with football helmets or racing helmets, it can be dangerous business.

Mike Hembree is NASCAR Editor for SPEED.com and has been covering motorsports for 30 years. He is a six-time winner of the National Motorsports Press Association Writer of the Year Award.
The opinions reflected herein are solely those of the above commentator and are not necessarily those of SPEED.com, FOX, NewsCorp, or SPEED

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Mike Hembree

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