Scott Speed’s Brilliant Bristol Driver Introductions Idea Washed Away

When NASCAR’s Sprint Cup Series qualifying session was rained out on Friday, Scott Speed’s No. 95 team was forced to pack up and go home. And that meant Bristol fans – and race fans around the country – were deprived of what would have been one of the funniest driver introductions ever.

At Bristol, each driver picks a song and then makes a comment to the crowd. This year, Bristol is holding a fan vote after the driver intros to see who had the best entrance; the winner gets $10,000 for a charity.

In order to try and take down likely winner Dale Earnhardt Jr., Scott Speed hatched a plan: He would walk out to Carly Rae Jepsen’s “Call Me Maybe,” but with a twist.

“No big deal there, right? Whoopty doo,” he said. “But I was actually going to have my phone number on the car, and they were going to ‘Call Me, Probably!’”

Yep, you read that right: Speed was going to publish his actual phone number to the whole country, and also read everyone at Bristol his digits over the public address system.

“I was going to get on the microphone and say, ‘Get a pen and paper, you’re gonna want to write this down!’” he said with a laugh.

His spotter, Josh Williams, published Speed’s phone number on Twitter a few months ago as a prank – and Speed got a kick out of it. His phone rang non-stop for three days, he said, and he mostly answered it when it could.

“It honestly produced some really interesting conversations,” he said. “It was enjoyable, actually. After a few days, I turned it off for a week, and I think most people figured I changed my number. After that, I never got anything.”

Unfortunately, he won’t get the opportunity to have more conversations anytime soon – and neither will Speed’s chosen charity, the Crohn’s & Colitis Foundation of America (Speed has ulcerated colitis). Speed’s phone number was already on his No. 95 car, but it was covered up with red tape the team was going to peel off on Saturday.

“I think the drive back home from Bristol would have been really entertaining,” he said.

MORE INFO: Check out the CCFA’s web site