From last night.....
Mayfield emerges, planning new business venture
Jeremy Mayfield made an appearance on Speed Channel’s “Race Hub’’ show Tuesday night. It was the first time Mayfield has spoken publicly in a while. With an appeal against NASCAR in the courts, there wasn’t much Mayfield could say about his battle with the sanctioning body over his failed drug test in May 2009.
Mayfield did say he’s looking to start a metal recycling business and talked about maybe doing some dirt racing in the South.
Here’s more of what Mayfield said on the show in his interview with Steve Byrnes, who noted afterward that there were more questions that Mayfield could not answer because of pending litigation against NASCAR.
On what he’s been up to, Mayfield said:
“Little bit of everything. We’ve been, obviously, in the battle with NASCAR in the court and everybody knows that. As far as personally, taking care of stuff around the house and trying to figure out what I’m going to do next, what direction I’m going in and as far as career-wise, just a lot of things are going on and just trying to make decisions on what we are going to do. For the most part, trying to stay busy around the farm or whatever. Kind of in the process of opening up a new business, kind of like the metal recycling business. Really excited about that. Other than that, just taking it day by day.’’
Mayfield’s reaction to reaction of fans from those who are on his side to those who aren’t:
Mayfield: “I’ve seen a lot of people with mixed emotions. I didn’t want to be a part of this. I’m just letting everybody know that. I didn’t want to be in a lawsuit. I didn’t want to go out in my career like this. I didn’t want any of this happen either.’’
You have been a punchline, is it hard for you to sit back and take it?
Mayfield: “Everyday. It was hard for me to come here today and I appreciate you all having me on the show, but it’s hard for me to come here because I fight this urge to, I got a lot of things I want to say that I can’t obviously because of the litigation because I don’t want to get into any more trouble or whatsoever by what I’m saying. It’s just hard because when you’re in this situation there’s a lot of anger now and things that could come out that wouldn’t be good for either one of us. It’s tough when you walk around everyday and you get the chance to finally tell your side of the story, there’s so much more to it that you could tell that would really enlighten a lot of things that you just can’t tell.’’
Mayfield was asked when will this all be over:
Mayfield: “I don’t know. It’s probably going to be a long time now because of the appeal process could take a year or a year and a half or whatever. Again, I’ve come to grips with myself and my wife and our families and we’ve come to the grips that it’s going to be a long time and we’ll have to endure that.’’
Will you race again?
Mayfield: “I can race. I can’t race in NASCAR seriously. I’m thinking real hard about doing some dirt races with a dirt team we’re trying to put together. We’re not sure yet. I want to race. I’d love to go IndyCar racing if I could do that. I’d love to go drag racing if I could do that. But I want to do it the right way. I don’t want to struggle anymore. It’s got to be the right situation to do it. I’ve just been kind of waiting. I just don’t know what I want to do yet.’’
You’ve been low profile lately:
Mayfield: “I wish it never happened. I wish I could continue on with what we had going on with the team and still be back in the sport. I’ll take it as it comes. All the race fans out there, I miss all my fans, I miss going to the race track. My wife misses traveling also. We just miss the daily deal going on. We’ll make it through. It could be worse.’’
He may be coming to a dirt track near you.
