The Scene Vault Podcast -- DK Ulrich on Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Cheating in NASCAR

all right so 1978 Southern 500 uh you get in a pretty bad accident with grand adcocks yeah um what do you remember about the accident itself because it was a pretty substantial serious accident I mean I I got I got killed and lived through it I remember that that they did stuff on the I don't remember it but my my people were there and had me on the ground outside the car just trying to get me some pulse going and and I knew that it was a bad deal what I remember about it is is I was doing good I was doing I was not a lap down yet I don't remember when it happened on the racetrack David Pearson was behind me and I'm seeing him coming and I see Grant started to spin and he was real narrow and always Ben still is but he went up the track backwards and I thought and I'm almost on him right then and I said I'm just going to go below I can get I can get between him David's coming I don't want to I don't want him to pass me and I and he came right back down Richard Grant came right back down the thing and I popped him nearly full speed yeah in the in the video you can see it on the video if you if you got one of those from 78 I've seen it you know it just was a sudden stop yeah and got my attention but that's what I remember about it happening but I remember waking up in the in the hospital and Grant was in there with me and he looked just the opposite of me I had bruises all the way down the right side of me my right leg um body everywhere everywhere was my right side and everything on his left side was was really we would look like the opposite twins in there and went uh we all survived it you talked about getting some attention um from that point how did you find out about what Nascar had found on the car they discovered a nitrous oxide bottle how did you find out that they had found something bill gashway called me in the hospital in the hospital and that was probably two days later and if you remember Bill gashway he was like he wanted to be like Billy France I mean he was he was very uh in charge and and when he said it it was casting Stone and he just called me up and he said that that the car had been broken a half in front and the line was shown and we had to dig into it and find it we found Nature's bottle and we're going to give you a little vacation a five thousand dollar penalty and I was at it for the rest of the year that was in September um that was a big hit to me how long had the bottle been there because from what I again what I read you said that it wasn't hooked up that it had been in the car for quite some time and I never said that but but it was hooked up okay all right and and we I put it in in the in the in the frame rail and then left where you turn it on I made it where it looked like the bolt the head bolt like a three-quarter uh head bolt and that's all you saw and it was was down by the frame it was right where there was another bolt going somewhere you know and all you got to do is put the wrench on it turn it to turn it on and we could do that it was only good for qualifying you know it really wasn't doing anything to for performance during the race but you know you just turn the ball the other way and go racing to see it later and it had a line that went up into the this was down at the frame rail and it came up by the radiator around the loop that was around the front of it back down roll bar over here and sprayed right into the into the air cleaner wow and when you and there was a solenoid that I could hit in the car with regular switch where it said the alternator you know I could flip that switch and you get about uh maybe 30 seconds of of nitrous oxide straight in the motor and like for example at Rockingham I wasn't going to make the race the second day qualifying I said I'm gonna I'm gonna blow the nitrous oxide and I go around and take the grain and take the one and two and then as soon as I could do it I hit it on the back stretch and the car goes way out like this here you know hang on I'm not letting up you know and I just went like that and got all the way down into three and four and got fast time of the day oh that's all it was for I'm not trying to cheat anybody I just need to get in a race you know yeah and that's I didn't have the horsepower and so we had to um we had to get some so you're basically just trying to get to where the Front Runners were yeah or anything you know and sometimes um I mean we did all kinds of things I I made tires uh I made tires by taking the taking the right side tires and left side I take the left side tires and grind the number off of it and they're about that big like that is to say whatever it was on it and then you take the um well you take the left side tires and and and you take the right side tires and make a put Bondo on that thing and then when you pull the Bondo off you have like a um what do you call it an imprint yeah take that and then you take left side tires and get one around no more I'm gonna put black silicone in where that was you put this Bond back on it and then it let it dry and take it off and now the left side tires have the right side number on them and so when you go to qualify you can just put them right over there and I'll tell you how how much I did that is that Harry Hyden had the shop next to me over Charlotte Motor Speedway and whatever year it was that Lenny Pond drove for him they won the um at the time they had like a challenge where the guy that won the most pole positions won something I don't know what it was they did but they they won it with my attires and wow Harry I had made a deal with me and I made a deal with him and we got real tires from him if I make a set of tires for him so that he could win the poll and then during the race they'd shoot tires to me so we could we had something to run that's that's a little deal we made no money just yeah just helping each other out that's it that's it and uh getting competitive all right so we have we have nitrous we have tires surely there was an a wealth of other things that you that that were going on at that time oh yeah but you know the the inspection inspections weren't anything like they are probably and they got everything today you're not going to get away with anything but I took in in my car I want to be able to seal it off in the front where they allow that now I mean they can put tape all over everything and then erase they didn't allow you to block it off in the front so I took a uh like a thing you have on your uh in your house that you open and close it and they go like this here and they go like that okay I don't know what that's called uh but a regulator that you have somewhere in your house you know took two of those put them together put them behind the grill that you could I could move it with a cable and I could open it or close it however I wanted to you know and wow and so we were blocked off when we qualified nobody else I don't know how many other guys had something going on like that but but it was hidden where you couldn't see it you could see it easily if you're going to take it apart and look at it but but it was you know it was clear in the front look in there it looks good and and that's all they ever did you know and then try to go out and I can block off when others couldn't we did that really to get in the race not something you use all day you know it's just something you would use in the race to get in it and not the race and they're qualifying to get in there to make it into race however you could and we did everything from soaking the tires you know I ran them all the time I ran the wrong tires on the car just to get in the race but then when if you get in the top ten they confiscate your tires they wouldn't do anything with them they just throw in a pile over there but you had to start on those the way it was in that day so you really didn't want to qualify in the top 10. that you need to be in the top 20. and so you do whatever you got to do I mean that's what we did all of us did that all of us Independents we were we were camaraderie we were we were all in this together you know and whatever we could do to get in the race we did and I remember another time that that um Junior Junior's crew worked with me a lot and that and we should just trading off and doing I do favors for him on a racetrack or whatever and then and then I needed a motor to qualify at Daytona I did not have enough power to get into race I just simply didn't and I ask they qualified I think they they were in the top two on the first day America in those days you would qualify Monday Tuesday and Wednesday and then the qualifying race on Thursday but you you qualify four times and so you had a lot of different you know had time to work on everything try to get it well and all that and I made a deal with um uh I'm not going to say it was Tim Brewer but it was somebody I'm not going to mention any names Tim broer he'll remember it and uh and they had another guy they were doing tires and and I don't know I haven't heard from him in a long time his name was shorty that he was the Tire Guy with Junior but to get in this race they wanted three thousand dollars to use that motor and I said that's once they took it right out after they qualified and it was just sitting there if they're going to go in the truck and go up to North Wilkesboro but they put in my truck and then made a deal after them I got to have it for all four sessions in case I don't make it I got to be able to have it for that and agree to do it but what I did with that is um uh on the first day on Monday I gave it to JD McDuffie and we put it in his car and he went out and got in a race and I charged him fifteen hundred dollars and the second day anyway anyway I got I got another independent that was uh Herring Barrel Bailey okay we put it in his car and he got in a race and the third day I put it in my car and so I got uh fifteen hundred dollars each from that when I got the whole three thousand dollars and I got to use the motor for free I give that three thousand dollars over to whoever that was that let me have the engine over at Juniors and again all of us got in the race the whole three of us and none of us belonged in it I'm going to hire you as the same Vault podcast business manager I mean you know you're working in a closet here right now not very big but but it looks good great and I got all these suits behind me here that that several of them are drivers that I've had that over the years and it's really a neat little place so I can fix it where you'll have like the Taj Mahal to do your Show from in no time you heard it here we know how to do those things I believe that's what's called a verbal contract all right so getting back to Darlington yeah you were suspended for 12 races the rest of this year I don't know what the number was yeah I know it was five grand because I had to come up with that you know what was your reaction to that I married Carolyn rudden okay right then I said I'm going to be off for 12 weeks after I got well in the hospital uh I said I'm just gonna marry Carolyn Rudd and have some fun the rest of the year okay all right and then I got ready for Riverside what was going to be the next race I could run and I think you'll find that I qualified in the top 10 when I went back on that and maybe 11th it was somewhere right about then in nineteen 79 no yeah I went upset 1979 somewhere like that I was real proud of that with everything that was going on you talked about the stuff with Junior's crew and the engine that you got all the Independent Drivers in with the tires you know having the wrong numbers on them and everything how aware Was Nascar of all that was going on and it was it was it basically like a cat and mouse game or did they let some things slide Bob to help you guys out I I don't know of them ever helping me I mean there's another deal that we did long back I tell you about that sometime if you want to that just made me a kind of an outlaw and and I did my own thing uh and and NASCAR as far as I know they were trying to do whatever they did I think Gary um was what's his name Gary from California Nelson yeah Gary Nelson was running the show I think at that time and Dick Beatty and you know they just didn't have the uh they would kind of turn their head a little bit you know on some things and I remember for example I would bring a a really I'd pick up some girls the night before get her a pit pass and then when we went through inspection to do the you know where you put the the whatever the templates put the template over here and template over there I had my nose fixed up where it would go faster and this was at Daytona and when you put that thing on there you could stick your hand in between it you know so and and the guy's doing that I told him you get to pay attention tomorrow when you check my car out you know and I had this beauty big tits not many Clues on you know admit whatever you can get by with yeah come over and look at all of them and when they're doing that they're trying to put the template on you know and they didn't pay any attention to it they'd rather see the show the NASCAR itself I don't think you know anything about that but it's the guys that work in those positions you know you could you could get them to turn their head once in a while and and I don't think I ever did it to beat anybody I always did it to get interation just to get myself into race because I never belonged there anyway I didn't have the right equipment I didn't have you know I didn't grow up in racing like I mean I was 29 or 28 years old when I started you know I mean that guy's retiring at that age yeah yeah so that's that's all that's all I did I was in the once I get in a race um and I use the Right Tires I had everything pretty well the way it was I mean we then in fact we had to in order to survive in the races I had an engine that I built you know then we could change engines we could do a lot of things in those days but I had an engine that I built with low compression uh and just not the on the edge NASCAR engine it was a we call it the all-day unit put that in you can run all day okay and if you're going to be a little bit off but some of these tracks you could do better with an engine that was a little off you could you could during the race when the track gets slick or whatever it is you know I could hit the floor with my my engine and I'm not going to spin the tires and the other guys are out there you know going fast and trying to make the big big motor get through the corner better I just go in and stand on it and I get ready through the corner now when I got on a straightaway they go right back by me but I could keep up with them that way anyway I could I could do better at keeping up by using that but we use that engine and uh I'm gonna say 1976. we we use that engine in all the races same engine one that came to hand race same qualifying engine and we had the all-day unit and actually we get get to be on Saturday there we get qualified in a race not teleboys go get the all-day unit bear down here and then we change gears we we drop the gear ratio of one not one number and then put the all-day unit in and we're gonna go all day if we don't hit something all right so you you said that the drivers group that you helped organize kind of put you on the on on the backtrack with NASCAR that well okay you said it uh then you said that there was something else that happened that that really got you blacklisted well uh that was earlier than than that deal there but but when we went to our first race and it was in Columbia South Carolina we're trying to get to Atlantis didn't make it and we're working our way into you know we as all a whole nother story you know I'll write up that I'll put that in my book one day but gasway uh I I qualified 31st and they only took 30 cars all right so I got the rule book out and what you do is you get in your car and you start the motor up and if for any reason one of the other competitors that it can't get going then you go in you're the alternate you're the first alternate that's the way it worked at that time and I went down and I was 31st that was it I got out there sitting in my car and Earl Brooks couldn't get started you had to start under your own power too you know you couldn't get a couldn't get a push to get started you had to you had to um figure out how to get jumped or what he had to do to get started and didn't go it didn't go it didn't go in and then all the rest of the guys were already gone so I hauled ass I just said I'm in a race and I got over there and I got in the back the race or by back of the lineup came around the next time and they got the Black Flag out for me and and Earl Brooks still sitting on Pit Road okay I'll go around the next time and he took it the second time you know I want to make sure they were showing it to me and then they didn't have radios or anything and so I went back in and my my brother Ken that was that was had been with me all uh to start with the first three or four or five years that I he was with me all the way and Ken uh was pissed off he was you know he said I'm going to show you know effing gas away you know yeah yeah and he goes down there with with the rule book and gasways trying to run the race he got earphones on and everything you know and he's trying to show him in a rule but what's supposed to happen her book's still sitting on her still sitting there are you and I'm still in my car but my brother went down there and he's he got pretty belligerent I don't know what to say uh graphic gas away all right with gasway and then and gazaway turned to do something what he was doing and he he took his headset and pulled it apart and let it go and he said listen to me and as we just he said I'll deal with you later you know and he went on to do with it anyway they dealt with me there and it was that was my first race kid from California did everything wrong and and that put me on a list to begin with and I continued to be on that list until they underlined it when I did that driver's thing when I organized the drivers you know Richard was right in there to Richard Petty was right in there with us and right in a meeting and and said said it's got to be better for you guys you know you need to be here and you got to remember in that time Rick that that there were maybe maybe 12 Factory cars more likely eight at most of the races but you know some of the guys didn't race every week or didn't race in every race and the rest were all independence there ain't going to in that period of time I think not just because I'm an independent but I don't know what would have happened to the NASCAR I don't know how they would have dealt with that if they weren't in everyone across if there were any Independence you know there were like six guys out there going for a raise or 10 or whatever it is and and they'd all be a lot of line it'd be all fast but but they had no way to pass and I think it was a uh even even later in in uh in life after I retired and after a lot of things happened when the Hall of Fame started up here I thought they should have a a a plaque or a something that that recognized the Independent Drivers as a whole not me but just everybody that was an independent because we really made the show for for almost and we're the ones that wrecked we're the ones that got killed you know it's just um we were there for that period of time and then it grew to a point where they didn't need to be where there wasn't or Independence uh you had to have some sponsorship in order to keep going

Channel: The Scene Vault

Views: 78,032

Keywords: NASCAR, Grand National, Winston Cup, Scene, Winston Cup Scene, Racing, Motorsports, History, NASCAR History, Grand National Scene, NASCAR Hall of Fame, The Scene Vault, The Scene Vault Podcast

Id: x2H1Qpm1o4g

Length: 21min 23sec (1283 seconds)

Published: Wed Sep 21 2022