CHARLOTTE
Jeremy Mayfield will go head-to-head with NASCAR this week in what might well be his last shot at racing again this season.
If a federal judge agrees Wednesday to lift his indefinite suspension for a failed random drug test, Mayfield has indicated that he'll go straight to Daytona International Speedway to try to resurrect his career.
But if the decision goes in NASCAR's favor, Mayfield is in for a long legal battle that could personally and professionally destroy him.
As the first driver suspended under a toughened new drug policy, Mayfield was thrust into a career-killing drama that has mushroomed since a random sample collected May 1 came back positive for what NASCAR deemed "a dangerous, illegal, banned substance."
Mayfield immediately denied drug use and has blamed his positive result on a mix of Adderall for Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder and Claritin-D for allergies. Then Mayfield sued to have his suspension lifted, and things got interesting.
The past 30 days have been a flurry of legal activity, culminating in the filing of hundreds of pages of documents as both sides prepared for their showdown in U.S. District Court.
NASCAR filed court documents last night that show that Medtox Laboratories in Minnesota, an independent laboratory, found an illegal substance in the urine samples that led to Mayfield's suspension.
Among the other paperwork was a six-page affidavit in which Mayfield laid out his side of the story. He said he has never used methamphetamines and doesn't know how his drug test came back positive.
He also said that the suspension has crippled his career, forcing him to lay off 10 employees, borrow money from family and sell personal assets to meet his living expenses. Mayfield said that sponsors won't work with him, and he has not been able to send his team to the track the last five weeks.
So Mayfield needs a miracle to get back on track.
The question remains, though, just what does he have to return to?
Mayfield started the season as one of NASCAR's feel-good stories. Out of steady work since a 2006 firing from Evernham Motorsports, he put everything he had into Mayfield Motorsports. It was a low-budget, understaffed organization thrown together weeks before the Daytona 500 without a prayer of being successful.
Until he drove his way into the biggest race of the year.
Qualifying for the Daytona 500 briefly put Mayfield back in the spotlight, as the underdog who needed all the support he could get to go toe-to-toe with the deep-pocketed teams. But the light began to fade in just a few weeks, in part because of the product that Mayfield put on track.
Before his suspension, Mayfield had qualified for just five of 11 races and didn't have a finish higher than 32nd. His team was going nowhere fast, and bills were piling up. Triad Racing Technologies recently filed suit for $86,304.55 for parts, pieces and chassis work that it said Mayfield owes.
Then came the negative attention from the suspension, the public denials and the tense legal fight that have turned Mayfield into a sponsor's nightmare. Now, no company will touch him or his team.
So even if Mayfield is reinstated, he's not heading back to the most stable situation. And, NASCAR will almost certainly continue to fight the already cash-strapped Mayfield. It makes one wonder if the more sensible route would have been quietly serving his suspension and then attempting a career-saving comeback. Of course, participating in NASCAR's "path to reinstatement" would have been akin to admitting guilt, something that Mayfield has adamantly opposed since his suspension.
But the process might have been faster and most certainly cheaper.
More important, it couldn't possibly have damaged his career any worse than what the last seven weeks have done.
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