Editor’s Note: In a nod to our 92 years of history, each week SPEED SPORT will look back at the top stories from 20, 40 and 60 years ago as told in the pages of National Speed Sport News.
20 Years Ago — 2006
News: Officials from the Grand American Road Racing Ass’n have unveiled plans for three different series to compete on the 1.3-mile infield road course of the new Iowa Speedway July 13-14, 2007.
Headlining the weekend’s activities will be the Grand American Rolex Sports Car Series presented by Crown Royal Special Reserve on July 14.
Both the Daytona Prototypes and production-based GT machines will compete simultaneously under the lights.
Joining the Rolex Series will be the Grand-Am Cup Series and the new MOTO-ST endurance motorcycle racing series.
The two Grand-Am Cup Series classes, Grand Sport and Street Tuner, will compete in individual races, with the GS race slated for the afternoon of July 14. The ST class will do battle on the afternoon of July 13.
The MOTO-ST series will headline the schedule on July 13.
Winners: With one fist pumping and another shaking his teammates’s hand, Josh Wise climbed out of his No. 20 Tony Stewart Racing Enterprises Mopar/Bass Pro Shops Spike/Mopar on Saturday and became the sixth two-time Belleville Midget Nationals champion.
Wise, who won the Belleville Nationals three years earlier, caught leader Bryan Clauson on lap 29 and cruised to victory by more than a straightaway in the 40-lap event on the half-mile Belleville High Banks.
“I don’t know how I feel right now,” Wise said after the victory, which netted him $12,500. “I just have to thank my guys. They gave me a great car tonight, and this is big because we’ve been struggling all season. It’s definitely an upswing for us.”
Danny Stratton finished second, with Bud Kaeding, Levi Jones and Teddy Beach rounding out the top five.
One night after passing Stratton in the final turn for the preliminary triumph, Wise earned a more comfortable victory after taking the lead when Clauson and Keith Kunz Motorsports teammate Jay Drake endured misfortunes on laps 29 and 30.
Clauson, who dominated early and tolerated multiple challenges midway through the race from Drake and Wise, led the opening 28 laps after shooting ahead on the initial lap. He took advantage of several restarts to establish leads, but by the halfway mark he was involved in a four-way battle for the point.
By lap 25, Clauson had about a four-car-length advantage and was lapping cars at will. Drake couldn’t take advantage of Clauson’s dicing through lapped traffic, as he was busy holding off Wise and Stratton.
Then, tire trouble relegated the Kunz machines to the back of the pack. Drake, who was running second, was the first, as he pulled off the track on lap 29.
Wise wasted no time on the restart, pulling alongside Clauson and taking the point. While Clauson roared around the track looking for a counterattack, he suffered a flat right-rear tire and stopped on the track.
Wise wasn’t pressured when racing resumed, as he enjoyed a seven-car-length lead within two laps as the cars switched from the higher to the middle groove.
40 Years Ago — 1986
News: From one end of the garage area to the other, word is Terry Labonte will be Junior Johnson’s driver in 1987.
Johnson is not talking about who his driver will be and Labonte is not talking about his future plans.
It’s understandable. This is a game where million dollar deals are standard fare, politics is a way of life and drivers know better than to look beyond the next race. Hands are rarely played until the pot is right and the last bet is called. Only then do you show your hand.
There’s a season to finish and Johnson has a contract with his sponsor and his driver, although it has been announced that driver Darrell Waltrip will be leaving the Johnson team after this year.
Labonte has similar obligations to his sponsors and his car owners.
Billy Hagan, Labonte’s principal team owner, has said he would fight any link up between his driver and Johnson. Hagan says he has a contract with Labonte through the 1990 season.
But a fight isn’t likely, should Labonte want to make a move. It isn’t kosher for a team owner to want to keep a driver who wants to go elsewhere.
And it isn’t surprising that Johnson would be interested in the 29-year-old Labonte, who has six victories in NASCAR’s big-league racing.
Winners: Sinking Springs, Pa., driver Don Kreitz, Jr., sent shock waves through the sprint car fraternity Saturday night at Earl Baltes’ Eldora Speedway, winning the third annual Kings Royal sprint car spectacular and walking off with the largest first-place prize in sprint car racing history-$52,000.
“Unbelievable,” was the only way the quiet driver who concentrates his efforts on the clay ovals of Central Pennsylvania could describe his victory as a mob of fans chanted, “Pa. Posse, Pa. Posse … ”
And those fans from Pennsylvania had good reason to be proud, as Kreitz had done something most believed impossible.
In only his second visit to this lightning fast half-mlle oval, Kreitz outran one of the most outstanding fields of sprint cars ever assembled and took home more money for 20 mlles of
racing than many drivers make In their careers.
Jac Haudenschild, who led the middle stages of the race, finished second aboard the Nance No. 1st machine.
Dave Blaney was third, with Sammy Swindell and Bobby Allen completing the top five.
60 Years Ago— 1966
News: The Ford Motor Company will push the accelerator to the floor next year when it embarks on an expanded racing program at a cost of more than $10 million, roughly $4 for every car it sells domestically.
In disclosing last week that it would engage in every aspect of racing the company dispelled rumors that it might bow out of competition in view of the furor over car safety.
But Donald N. Frey, Ford vice-president and general manager of the Ford Division, flatly stated
”we do not plan to support factory teams in such in stock car racing for the 1967 season.
Frey added, however, “Ford would like to return to stock car racing on a constructive basis under terms that would be beneficial to sponsors, participants and fans alike.”
To this end he said the firm would retain “the services” of Holman and Moody, the firm’s contract operators in the racing field, “to test and develop our high performance equipment.”
In addition, Ford defended its racing plans as consistent with safety and said, “We learned things on the race track that enabled us to build belter and safer cars.”
Many automotive engineers question the premise that racing “improves the breed,” Ford’s rationalization for its new involvement in every aspect of car competition.
The decision to expand its racing activities was reached at a meeting or Ford’s special policy board.
Winners: Richard Petty made the Nashville 400 a one-man show as he breezed to a five-lap victory over Buck Baker, averaging 71.77 mph in his 1966 Plymouth before a r cord crowd of 15,161 fans a t Fairgrounds Speedway Saturday night.
Bobby Allison, plagued by an oil leak for the entire 400 laps, held on gamely to finish third.
The venerable Baker, who admits he’s been around racing as long as NASCAR president Bill France, really survived a scare at the finish. The engine on his 1966 Oldsmobile blew with one lap to go and Baker had to coast the rest of the way.
The race was relatively clean with only 41 laps being run under the yellow nag and no major wrecks. The worst wreck, probably occurred on the first lap when Darel Dieringer’s 1966 Ford spun on the backstretch.
Twenty-eight cars started, but only 11 were running at the end.
