Maldonado says he is the only driver supported by PDVSA

[bsanderson]

"PDVSA is supporting only one driver at the moment, which is myself," he said. "In the past, we had in the program three or four drivers and now there is only one. Some cars are using the logo of PDVSA but they are not supported by PDVSA – that is the truth of the situation."

[Rossfeld]

Yeah I scratched my head over that one. Also when he claimed he(Maldonado) wasn't sponsored by the government. PDVSA is state-owned isn't it? Potato, potato, etc.

So maybe, technically, Visoworld is funded by the ministry of sport or tourism or whatever it'd be, and he just runs Citgo logos because of the market he's in?

[bsanderson]

Yeah I scratched my head over that one. Also when he claimed he(Maldonado) wasn't sponsored by the government.

I think he might be playing with semantics a bit.

[Grizzlor]

Perhaps he's saying that I'm the only one who should be getting money?

[brundle]

Just verbal gymnastics. Pastor knows his career hangs by the slimmest of threads right now. Already a good deal of talk that Massa will get his seat next season.

[Outlaw]

I am a little confused. Who is this Father Maldonado? I didn't know there was a priest that drove IndyCar.

[Darth Airbox]

I am a little confused. Who is this Father Maldonado? I didn't know there was a priest that drove IndyCar.

Where does it say Father Maldonado?

[Buellboy]

Where does it say Father Maldonado?

Pastor Maldonado must be a Baptist.

[flyfishin]

Hola, Me Llamo Pastor Maldonado

[Openracer]

Petroleos de Venezuela SA (PDVSA) is the government owned oil company. This company bought Cities Services (Citgo), an American company, based in Tulsa, OK to use its crude from Venezuela. Citgo is the brand used in the USA and on some products in South America, otherwise PDV is the brand that is used outside of the USA.

The sporting ministry is also directing funds to racing with PDVSA and visit Venezuela logos. This may be what he is stating. Either way the check comes from the treasury of Venezuela.

Something tells me that racing money from Venezuela will be gone ASAP, now that the amounts are publicly stated in the news. Just my speculation.

[Rossfeld]

I think all the guys with names we struggle to place are gone(probably to jail). Maldonado is safe. If Viso survives it will be with a paycut.

[drdisque]

The more I read and think about this, the more I think that the guys implicated have to be Viso and Enzo Potolicchio

Think about it, a few years ago, Viso was an unheralded pay driver and now he's owns a car on one of the top teams in the sport and ins funding drivers through the ladder system. A few years ago Potolicchio was a no-name semi-pro F2000 driver, now he runs a multi-million dollar sports car team.

The system appears to have gone something like this:

Bolivars ---official transaction---> Dollars -----black market transaction----> A whole lot more Bolivars

now having a whole lot more Bolivars is nice, however, if you're a racing driver in the US, they're not terribly useful. To get that money out of Venezuela you have to go back to the official market and ask for more Dollars. To do that you have to come up with some reason to justify why you're going back and asking for more dollars, thus Viso and Potolicchio starting their own race teams. The revenue (prize money, any US sponsorship, pay drivers in the sports cars) will be paid in dollars, effectively "laundering" the money invested on the race team. In addition, anything sold off from the race team will also be in Dollars with no requirement to trade it back in for Bolivars, also "laundering" it.

Sports cars and Indycars have always been a great way to launder money. Just ask Randy Lanier, the Wittingtons, and John Paul Sr.

[Rossfeld]

Hasn't Viso been in a PDVSA car going back to day 1? He's only gone HVM>KV>HVM as Andretti satellite. So there really isn't anything untoward, visibly. For all we know he's always had a healthy budget.

That's not to say he isn't a suspect, they pretty much all are. But it's the guys charging several hundred thousand for a day of Nationwide practice that are being comically obvious.

[Anwin]

So...what will be the T minus for the Would You thread about the Priest?

[Rossfeld]

If he loses his money for F1 why would it suddenly be approved for Indycar? The Evil America even got namechecked by one of the ministers when he talked about Racecargate.