The owner of a North Carolina race track announced the sale of the so-called Bubba Rope this week, citing a rope found earlier this month in the garage used by NASCAR driver Darrell “Bubba” Wallace Jr. on a track in Alabama.
According to an ESPN report, 311 Speedway owner Mike Fulp posted to the Facebook Marketplace on Wednesday that he was selling “Bubba Rope” for just under $ 10 each.
“Buy your Bubba Rope today for just $ 9.99 each, they come with a lifetime warranty and work very well,” as reported in the post.
The Fulp post was withdrawn on Thursday afternoon after it was subjected to a backlash from fans. Some said, according to ESPN, that they would no longer attend track events about the product.
The news follows controversy after Wallace, the only black NASCAR driver, found a rope on a rope in his assigned garage at the Talladega Superspeedway in Alabama.
The incident sparked both FBI and NASCAR investigations into a possible hate crime, but it was determined that the rope had been in the garage since at least October and was being used as a pull on the garage door.
NASCAR has released a photo underlining that the rope “was real,” and Wallace has replied that while he is glad it was not a hate crime, the associations of a rope still disturb him.
“I’ve been running all my life,” said Wallace. “We have run out of hundreds of garages that have never had garage pulls like this. So, people who want to call it a garage tug and post all the videos and photos of the knots as evidence, go ahead, but from the evidence that we have, and have, it’s a direct noose. “
NASCAR just released a photo of the garage pull rope that became a lasso at Talladega. pic.twitter.com/gRAUAJoYv2
– Jeff Gluck (@jeff_gluck) June 25, 2020
Fulp reportedly removed more than just the “Bubba Rope” ad after multiple users reappeared in Facebook posts, including a saying about blacks: “I think we should give them a Kentucky Fried Chicken Bucket, 2 watermelons and a plane trip back to Africa. ” ”
In another deleted post, he scoffed at the death of George Floyd, an unarmed black man whose death last month in Minneapolis police custody has sparked national calls for police reform and an end to racial injustice.
North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper (D) condemned Fulp’s comments in a statement to the Winston-Salem Journal, saying “this incident of racism is horrible and embarrassing. North Carolina is better than this.”
According to the Journal, local NAACP leaders also condemned the posts.
“It’s horrible that someone posts something of that nature,” said Jeff Crisp, president of the Reidsville NAACP chapter. “This is not the time for comments like this, only causing unnecessary tension.”
Fulp and racetrack officials did not respond to requests for comment from ESPN or local media.
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