L.W. Wright pulled off the greatest con in motorsports history. But what really
happened that day? And has his true identity finally been revealed? Keep
watching to find out more about this wild bit of sports legend.
It shouldn't come as any surprise that nobody is able to just enter a NASCAR race on a whim,
with no racing experience to speak of. At least, no one is supposed to be able to do
that — but in 1982 one mysterious man pulled it off, successfully talking his way onto
the starting grid at one of NASCAR's most famous and fastest tracks: the Talladega Superspeedway.
The silver-tongued driver's name, or at least the one he entered the race under,
was L.W. Wright. And hardly anything is known about him. He would later become
known as the D.B. Cooper of Racing, a nod to the infamous plane hijacker
who disappeared after parachuting into the forests of the Pacific Northwest in 1971.
L.W. Wright surfaced ahead of the 1982 Winston 500 held at Talladega,
a 2.66-mile track with high-banked turns and speed in excess of 200 miles per hour.
He called the head of a marketing firm named Bernie Terell and told him that
he was an experienced NASCAR driver who planned on entering the race with his team,
Music City Racing. Terell bought the story and gave Wright $7,500 toward race weekend expenses.
Of course, Wright would need a car if he wanted to enter the race. Sterling
Marlin would eventually go on to win 10 races at the highest level of NASCAR,
but in 1982 he was just a 25-year-old driver with a handful of Cup Series starts to his name.
He was contacted by L.W. Wright, who was hoping to purchase a car from him. Marlin sold the
mystery man a car which was paid for with $17,000 cash and a check for $3,700 to cover the rest.
Marlin also asked if he could be Wright's crew chief for the race, and Wright agreed.
To drum up publicity for his run at Talladega Superspeedway,
Wright contacted a newspaper reporter in Tennessee named Larry Woody. Wright told Woody that his
team had the financial backing of country music legends Merle Haggard and T.G. Sheppard. This was
completely untrue, of course, and Sheppard's attorney even contacted Woody to tell him.
Woody went back to Wright who conceded that he had made that particular announcement a little early.
There was still the matter of obtaining the necessary license to race, though,
without which Wright wouldn't even be let on track. Despite having no record of racing history
and no proof of any experience, Wright entered the office responsible for doling
out the necessary credentials for NASCAR and simply talked his way onto the grid.
Talladega is known for its high speeds and the style of racing
often seen there, with cars racing in packs and sometimes just inches apart.
One driver's error can trigger a massive wreck. This is why it's so amazing that
a completely inexperienced driver was allowed to start the race, especially
in an era of racing that did not feature the same safety advancements it does today.
Wright made his debut appearance behind the wheel of his #34 Chevrolet at the Winston 500,
which took place on May 2nd, 1982. Despite crashing in practice,
Wright managed to qualify for the race and started 36th in a field of 40.
However, Wright wouldn't make it far into the race, retiring on lap 13 of 188 with
an engine problem. This was good for a 39th place finish, enough to earn him
$1,545 in prize money. After the race, L.W. Wright vanished; he left his car at the track and was
never seen or heard from again. A UPI article from the time quotes Sterling Marlin as saying:
"NASCAR has a warrant out for him on bad check charges and so does Goodyear
and an auto parts company. He's left a lot of checks floating around."
Decades later, NASCAR historian Ken Martin asked:
"Will we ever solve the mystery of L.W. Wright?"
But it seems like we might have: in May 2022,
the Scene Vault Podcast released an interview with Larry Wright, a man who claims to be
L.W. During the show, Wright addressed the controversy behind his disappearance, saying:
"If you could find somebody that said that I owed them $30,000, you tell them and I'll face 'em."
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