He’s been called the D.B. Cooper of NASCAR. L.W. Wright conned his way into a race car, a race team, and one of NASCAR’s biggest races, and then poof—he was gone.

Con artists and swindlers are nothing new in the crazy world of auto racing. Indeed, it’s been said that just to survive in the professional race biz, you may need a little hustler in your personal skill set. But L.W. Wright—if that was his real name, and you can bet it wasn’t—took the game to a whole new level. Without a dime of his own and using only his smooth tongue, in 1982 he finagled his way into a race car, a race team, and one of the top races on the Winston Cup schedule, the Winston 500 in Talladega. And then, like the famous skyjacker D.B. Cooper, he vanished into thin air.

Much of what we know about the caper was chronicled by Larry Woody, veteran NASCAR beat writer for The Tennessean, Nashville’s daily newspaper.  To make a long story short: Somehow, in April of 1982 Wright managed to persuade Bernie Terrell, a PR man on Music Row in Nashville, to advance him $30,000 plus $7,000 in expenses to fund his alleged race team, Music City Racing. Wright claimed the team was sponsored by country music stars Merle Haggard and T.G. Sheppard, but they had never heard of him, it was later learned.

With Terrell’s funds in hand, Wright purchased a 1981 Monte Carlo Winston Cup car from local racer Sterling Marlin for $20,700. (Black and gold, it bore the number 34.) The son of NASCAR veteran Coo Coo Marlin, Sterling was not yet a Winston Cup regular himself but an aspiring short-tracker in the Nashville area. The younger Marlin, who would later win the Daytona 500 twice, also agreed to serve as crew chief and round up a pit crew for the upcoming Winston 500 at Talladega on May 2.

Marlin would later say that Wright’s story did not add up and that despite his claims of being an experienced driver with 43 Busch series starts, Wright seemed lost at the race track and didn’t know the ropes. Still, Wright somehow managed to qualify the Monte Carlo at Talladega with a speed of more than 187 mph, though he crashed on his second qualifying lap, doing significant damage to the car (above).

Marlin and crew patched the Monte Carlo back together for the race, which Wright started in 36th position. And thanks to the NASCAR channel on YouTube, you can watch Wright’s entire NASCAR career in the original ESPN telecast of the ’82 Winston 500. There, Wright is mentioned only barely and briefly before he was quickly lapped by the field and black-flagged, officially credited with 13 laps and a 39th place finish. He parked the car, abandoned it in the garage area, and then promptly disappeared, leaving a wake of bounced checks behind him. The victims included NASCAR, which was stung for the license and entry fees, and tire supplier Goodyear, along with everyone else who was unfortunate enough to do business with him. NASCAR swore out a warrant for Wright’s arrest and PR man Terrell hired a private detective to hunt him down, but in nearly 40 years, he hasn’t been seen since.

UPDATE: L.W. Wright has been traced, found, and interviewed by veteran NASCAR journalist Rick Houston. ESPN story here. And since then, he’s landed in more legal trouble. Story from The Scene Vault here.