Rusty Wallace and Ray Evernham were on the NASCAR Cam video teleconference on Tuesday from the NASCAR Research and Development Center in Concord, N.C. Wallace, the 1989 Cup Series champion driver, and Evernham, a Cup Series champion crew chief, offered their opinions on start-and-park entries:

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I think those people are taking out of the sport rather than giving to it, and I just don't like it.

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-- RAY EVERNHAM

Q: I wanted to ask both of you guys first off, how do you look at those in the Cup and in the Nationwide series at the back who are essentially kind of the start-and-parkers? Do you look at those as guys who are somewhat, in a sense, smart business people? There are a couple teams that have already earned close to $2 million doing it this year. Or is this something that's kind of a drag on the sport, in the sense of it's not in the true sense of maybe what a competitor should be doing on the racetrack?

Evernham: I can give you my opinion: If you've got a guy that's running the whole series and he's racing sometimes and he's got a week that he just can't afford it and he has to do a start-and-park -- but 75, 80 percent of the time he's racing -- you can deal with that. But I don't really care for the guys that come in there and they plan to do a start-and-park. I think those people are taking out of the sport rather than giving to it, and I just don't like it.

Wallace: I agree with you totally. I'm a little vocal about this. Again, if the guy has got plans to compete in this series and puts some good racing on for the fans and help build the great name of NASCAR by racing, that's one thing. But if they're going to come in, like Ray just said, and just go find a car and just get in and as soon as they make one lap just pull out, grab the money and go home ... yeah, it's a business, it sure is, but for the guys that are out there competing every single week and working like crazy to find sponsors like all of us are and have that happen, I don't like it.

I know this is probably going to start a firestorm, but I'm not big on it. I totally agree with what you said, Ray. If his intention is to run and he's running and all of a sudden he has four or five bad weeks where he's kind of down on his luck, he doesn't have the money and he's got to do a start-and-park, so be it. But to start out from the get-go and plan, 'I'm going to work this system and just do a start-and-park and just take the money and run and not invest it putting a show on,' I've got a problem with that.

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'I'm going to work this system ... just take the money and run,' I've got a problem with that.

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-- RUSTY WALLACE

Q: Can you further just explain that, because some of these people would say that they're trying to do that to kind of get started and try to make the money that they can get into an organization kind of like yours, Rusty, or what you had, Ray. Can you further explain, is it just the spirit of the competition, or why is it so bad because somebody would say, 'Look, on the Cup side there's only 45, 46 cars showing up at some of these races.' Are they really taking away a spot from anybody?

Evernham: Again, from my standpoint, I think it is. If you want to race, if you're really trying to make it in the sport and get a sponsor, running one or two laps and pulling in is not going to get it for you. I'd be fighting for everything I was worth, I'd be asking guys to give me tires off their car, or beg, borrow and steal to try and run a whole race. That's how you get a sponsor.

There are a lot of people that come in and they look at a business plan and they figure at the end of the year they can take away a couple hundred thousand bucks and put it in their pocket. They look at it as a purely business. It's just not that to me. I've grown up in the sport, I've been around, I've seen tons and tons of people sacrifice their lives and families and things like that to be in it, so I take it as a little bit of a slap in the face when a guy wants to come in and just take money out of the sport without putting something in it.

If you want to be in it, that's great. There's enough people there that will help you. There's tons of guys helping people like Morgan Shepherd and people like that. You can always get a used tire or a used part. There's some great guys, Rick Hendrick, Richard Childress, myself, Rusty, that have given plenty of parts to people who really wanted to race so they can keep racing. I don't think there's an excuse for having a business plan and saying, 'OK, we're going to make 50 grand this week' and taking that check and going home. I have a tough time stomaching it.

Wallace: Well said. Another guy you just said, Morgan Shepherd, there's a guy right there who doesn't have a sponsor on his car, and talk to some people, and people do help him. Morgan goes out to put a show on. If you look at some of the last races he's had, he's run the whole race. He's run all the laps. We've talked about him a lot on television, and if you just go out there, run one lap and get off the track, we're not going to talk about you because you're not there.

I've really got a problem with what I call working the system -- just run a lap, just plan to run a lap. In fact, I even had one of those guys say to me one time, 'What is it you don't understand about start-and-park. That means start the race and park it right now.' I'm like, 'Wow, that's not the way I was brought up.'

• The charts below are drivers who started the June races at Michigan, site of this weekend's Cup and Nationwide series events. These drivers completed 40 or less laps and parked the car for reasons other than a crash: