I've yet to find any credence to that aside from someone's blog, which was in Spanish. It claimed that VR was an accident when Violet and Rust colors got mixed together and they liked the result. This doesn't make much sense since Oakley outsources the dying of the poly-carbonate to another company and then melts down the resulting pellets. Furthermore Rust didn't exist since the early 90's and the Violet at the time was only an iridium; the violet base wouldn't appear until much later.

But as things go, once something gains traction, it gets passed around, hence reviving this thread now that I finally found something directly from Oakley referencing the color that we've been calling it for 11 years or so now.

Hey I found this strange little lens in my Half Jacket collect... Forgot how much I really loved this lens... VR28 Gold Iridium Polarized XLJ cut..

It's one of the best all purpose lenses. I have 300+ glasses, and I wear my VR28 Flaks everyday