Waltrip considered withdrawal

In a tense press conference at Daytona today, an emotional Waltrip said that he and his wife Buffy - who officially owns the No.55 Toyota entry - made the decision to race this morning after giving consideration to pulling out.

"We're going to race - it's what racers do," said Waltrip, who has won NASCAR's biggest event on two occasions. "We came real close to not racing today.

"I know there will be a cloud over anything I accomplish because of what happened, but I've had encouragement from my sponsors and Mr [Mike] Helton [NASCAR chief], we're going to do all we can do to race our way into the Daytona 500.

"It's going to be the first step to rebuilding everyone's faith in us."

Waltrip's car will be crew chiefed by Scott Eggleston this weekend, after David Hyder was ejected from the Speedway on Wednesday. Waltrip said no one on his team will face disciplinary action until an "aggressive" investigation into what happened is completed.

He said he had "no idea" what the illegal substance found in his car's intake manifold on Sunday was, but admitted: "Even if it was hair gel, it wasn't meant to be there."

He added: "When I went to bed on Saturday night, I was thinking life doesn't get much better than this. Of course, that all changed on Sunday. The act of an individual or individuals was not a reflection of our team, sponsors or manufacturer.

"I'm here today to apologise to the fans, sponsors and the other team owners. I'm ready to bear all responsibility for what happened."