Former Employees of Knoll Gas/Torco Race Fuels Return With Competition Race Fuels …

All Bill Card and his business associates want is a fair chance.

Card is one of a half-dozen former Knoll Gas/Torco Race Fuels employees hoping to resurrect a familiar brand albeit under the new name Competition Race Fuels, Inc.

He feels the hard-working employees were the victims of what he felt was damage perpetrated by top level employees of the former Knoll Gas/Torco Race Fuels regime.

Card and his constituents are in the early stages of what promises to be a monumental challenge in rebuilding a positive business from bitter ashes. Former Employees of Knoll Gas/Torco Race Fuels Return With Competition Race Fuels …

All Bill Card and his business associates want is a fair chance.

Card is one of a half-dozen former Knoll Gas/Torco Race Fuels employees hoping to resurrect a familiar brand albeit under the new name Competition Race Fuels, Inc.

He feels the hard-working employees were the victims of what he felt was damage perpetrated by top level employees of the former Knoll Gas/Torco Race Fuels regime.

Card and his constituents are in the early stages of what promises to be a monumental challenge in rebuilding a positive business from bitter ashes.

“This is a good viable business that has produced good sales,” Card said. “I think one of our foremost goals before being thrown out of a perfectly good job with no [real reason]… in the end we knew something was wrong but we didn’t know the real extent of it. A lot of us ended up becoming unemployed over the whole situation.”

Card said there are no job titles in their new Competition Race Fuels business which is doing business under the parent company Bolt LLC.

“One of the real reasons why we [former employees] all came back and the new owners chose to buy it was, and regardless of what some people may think, it was and will be a good product.”

The new race gas will be blended in Decatur, MI., on the same property as the convenience store formerly owned by Knoll and now under the ownership of Bolt LLC.

Card believes a strong sportsman market exists and they hope to capitalize on the demand.

“We are going to focus on the sportsman racers because in the past they were the ones who got very little attention,” Card said, describing the business practices of the previous owners.

The ownership of Competition Race Fuels is made up of combination of former employees according to one of the principals Tim Tortorelli, who was the former head of security.

In addition to Tortorelli, the ownership group is comprised of Knoll’s ex-wife Christine Knoll and longtime Torco executive Shelly Smith. Outside of those named entities, are local investors who have chosen to keep their identities anonymous.

Tortorelli believes the decision by those investors to remain anonymous has fueled speculation Evan Knoll is somehow involved in the new venture.

“That’s the problem. I think because some local investors don’t want to be named and that immediately throws up a red flag that Knoll is involved,” Tortorelli said. “They just don’t want to be named but I can promise you right now – one of them is not Evan Knoll.”

Though Knoll never stated a company name, someone claiming to be Knoll has made statements on a MySpace page of a planned return.

The purported blog statements and the general consensus of Knoll’s involvement amongst outside parties, by Card’s assessment, has caused the race fuel end of Knoll’s sold off business more grief than the other entities which have skated free of such judgment.

“The propane company and other business ventures were sold off, yet we remain in the funk of this problem,” Card contended. “We are the only one that is getting the finger pointed at them saying, 'Hey, they have him as an advisor'.

“We’re as green as green can be and trying as hard as we can. Living in someone else’s shadow isn’t helping us at all. I just hope people will give us a chance.

“We’re going to do all we can to keep the product on the market and supply the racers and the hobbyists who relied on that fuel for so long.”

Card tries to look at the situation as an outsider and even he admits he’d be skeptical.

“I’ve already made calls to previous customers and that is the first wall we always run into,” Card said. “We just need to establish why we are here in the first place and it’s because the other stuff happened. There’s no way he [Knoll] could even be involved in something like this with the trouble that he’s in. I don’t know what it’s going to take to ease people’s minds that he’s not involved with us. That’s the case, plain and simple. I’d venture to say a lot of the people that are here now wouldn’t be here if he was.”