Story by: Langley Austin ~ [email protected]

Nashville, TN(May 24, 2012) — Last weekend was a controversial one for Late Model Stock Car racing and the controversy all started at Kingsport Speedway last Friday night when Nate Monteith’s apparent win was protested by the second place finisher and tomorrow night, that’s likely where the controversy will pick up again.

Monteith appeared to have cruised to his fourth win of the season on Friday night, May 18th, but following the race, second place finisher, Daniel Pope II and his team led by crew chief, Randy Weaver filed a protest that would see every piece of his engine be tore down. In the early morning hours of Saturday when the tear down was completed, Monteith’s pistons were being taken back to the NASCAR R&D Center, which in racing is typically a formality before being officially disqualified.

Monday afternoon, Monteith got the call and he was officially thrown out from his fourth win, handing Pope his third win of the season and the points lead. While we caught up with Monteith Monday night and got his side of the story, we hadn’t spoke with Pope or his team until today and considering that Monteith specifically called out Pope’s crew chief, we figured it was best to talk to him.

While he didn’t throw any jabs at Monteith, Weaver did offer up that while Monteith is contending that the piston rings gave him no performance advantage, that the veteran crew chief doesn’t buy that.

“The whole piston ring deal, there’s more to it than the three-thousandths,” Weaver said in a phone interview. “He says there’s not a performance advantage and I don’t buy that at all. Now, I’m not an engine builder, but I have spoke to several and they all tell me as has JE Pistons that it does give him a performance advantage.”

Was it enough of an advantage for him to outrun Pope?

“I’m not saying it’s what got us beat, but it was wrong and that’s just it.”

When asked why the decision was made to protest Monteith, Weaver offered that it was simply a matter of timing.

“It all boils down to, I get paid to do a job. I get paid to run good and win races and I felt like the time was right for us to look. With the way things had changed with his car the last few weeks, I knew he had changed engine builders, so I had to see what was going on.”

“It’s one of those deals. Hey, he got busted. I’m not going to sit here and throw him or Jeremy UpChurch(the engine builder) under the bus. I’m not looking to do that at all, I just had to see what they had, to know what we’re up against.”

Many people also believed that Weaver must have been tipped off by someone that the piston rings weren’t right at which he laughed.

“For sure? No, I gambled, but I won. I didn’t know if anything was wrong for sure, just went off of history and gambled a little.”

Weaver isn’t sure where Monteith’s anger at him comes from and maintains that the deal wasn’t personal and said he even told Monteith that after the officials were finished with the inspection.

“That morning, Saturday morning when they finished taking the engine apart and were taking the pistons back, I went over and shook his hand and told him that it wasn’t personal, it was just business. He blamed it on my boss, on Daniel’s dad and said “I don’t think it was you”.”

“It was me, I suggested it, it was something I just had to know,” continued Weaver. “It is what it is, they get all mad and it don’t matter to me. But, be mad at me all the time, don’t tell me one thing and then go tell another story on the phone.”

Weaver also offered his opinion on Monteith’s comments about being able to beat them every week and not having to worry about Pope or anyone else.

“I’ll give him credit, he’s been the dominant car at times. He’s done it before, maybe he can. If he don’t though, he’ll look bad with all that talking he’s doing.”

Weaver and Pope were on the way to test at Kingsport Speedway today in preparation for tomorrow nights race during the phone interview earlier today and is hoping they’ve found a little extra that will get them back in victory lane.

“I work on the car every week,” continued Weaver. “Every week we do the same thing, we make changes to get better whether we win or finish 10th and we did that again this week.”

Weaver and his driver will certainly be one of the players tomorrow night when the green flag drops, but it will be interesting to see if Monteith can live up to his expectations or if Pope or someone else has caught up to him. They’ll also be joined by a trio of Motor Mile Speedway regulars who are expected to attend including Lee Pulliam, Mike Looney and Adam Long.

“We’re all out there for the same goal, added Weaver. “We’re all out there to win the Piston Cup.”