Should NASCAR change its drug policy?
4/14/2008 12:56 PM
Eagle Pit Shack Guy wrote:
Alright, my OPINION is this. I've stated it before, and we got into 1 heckuvan argument over this. But, I'll chime in again because God knows we need more arguments in this forum.
MANDATORY WEEKLY TESTING. Do it the morning of each and every race. It takes a couple of minutes to give the specimen, and even the busiest driver can take that much time. In fact, do it while the drivers are on their way to be introduced. They have to be there anyway, so use this. A few "collection areas" strategically placed, 5 minutes of every driver's time and it's over for the week.
This takes away the possibility of partaking directly before the race, or even the entire week OF the race. And, with some drugs, a lot longer than that.
I suppose that everyone would want a maximum allowable limit of alcohol, so that everyone can enjoy themselves the night before; BUT, what's the allowable limit going to be? How much impairment do you want to allow a driver? He/she/they might have most of the booze/beer out of their systems, but that hangover could lead to someone's serious injury or death.
I feel that they should have an EXTREMELY tough set of penalties for this. Not a "1 strike and you're out" policy as someone suggested, but their "immediate re-test" is a good idea. Some over-the-counter remedies can and have given false positives for other more serious drugs in the past. I do, however, feel that a second positive result of any kind should be dealt with swiftly and finally. No, I didn't say "1 for coke and 1 for beer" for example. I said "2 strikes and that's it". Plain, simple, no-questions asked, no excuses allowed.
There are constantly posts on here about "using your car as a weapon". Well, do we want these weapons in the hands of people who are impaired or otherwise influenced by drugs/alcohol?
Okay, let's hear all of the "a little beer never killed anyone" and "the good old boys ran half-plastered all the time" rebuttals.
I wonder if NASCAR would be interested in naming this policy the "Tim Richmond Last Chance Saloon?
I just read the book about him, finished it in four hours and on the same day the conversation about Aaron Fike started to heat up.
I don't know what you know about Tim Richmond, but he would probably not have survived in NASCAR as long as he did were such a policy in place. He didn't do "drugs", as they are popularly known, but he sure liked partying.
Your policy suggestion is probably close to what should be adopted. I'd like to see random selection without any advance notice, so driver intro would be out. The military has had outstanding success by using random testing. The morning they announce the test, they use the last digit of the social security number and last names beginning with A-M or N-Z. For me randomness is the key and this is probably as random as they will be able to get. But no advance notice and no set day of the week. There could be logistical issues involved with that last part, but I'm betting they're not insurmountable hurdles.
NASCAR has ruled with an iron fist and any system that was not random in nature could be used to target somebody they didn't want in the sport.
Read about what they did to Tim Richmond for a good example of how such a non-random system could be abused.
By the way, I found a book about Jan Opperman, but it's a bit pricey. I'm going to get it, but I just have other priorities at the moment.