The Oneida Daily Dispatch (Oneida, NY)
Most memorable one-win wonders
Music has its lovable one-hit wonders, such as Vanilla Ice, who has made a career off his song “Ice Ice Baby,” which first released in 1989. With that in mind, the NASCAR Cup Series has produced 60 one-race winners since the tour was formed in 1949 (then called Strictly Stock). Here is a list of notable onetime winners through the ages: Jim Roper (1 win in 2 career starts): Roper drove down from Kansas to compete in the first Cup Series race held June 19, 1949 at Charlotte Speedway, a .75-mile dirt oval out near the city’s airport area. Johnny Beauchamp took the checkered flag but was later disqualified for using illegal chassis parts. Roper moved to the top of the box even though he turned just 197 of the scheduled 200 laps. Johnny Mantz (1 for 12): If you only get one shot to win a Cup Series race, this was a good one — the inaugural Southern 500 at Darlington Speedway in 1950. Mantz outsmarted the 75-car field by using tires that were made for trucks. The tires were made of a harder compound than a normal street tire. Mantz wasn’t fast but as Darlington’s track surface wore out tires of faster cars he moved up the leaderboard by staying on the track. He beat second place Fireball Roberts, who was an upand-coming racing star, by nine laps. Wendell Scott (1 for 495): Scott had lapped the entire field two times at Speedway Park in Jacksonville, Florida, but it was Buck Baker who pulled into Victory Lane and celebrated the win on Dec. 1, 1963. Hours later, after the crowd of 5,000 fans left the track, NASCAR said it found the scoring error and awarded Scott the victory. To this day Scott is the only African-american driver to win a Cup Series race. Mario Andretti (1 for 14): In the 1967 Daytona 500, Andretti carried the colors of Bunnell Motor Co., which was a small Ford dealership in the county north of the Daytona Beach area. The car was a Holman-moody rocket ship and carried Andretti to victory in NASCAR’S premier racing event. The open-wheel great led 112 of 200 laps with teammate Fred Lorenzen hot on his tail. Greg Sacks (1 for 263): The 1985 Firecracker 400 produced what is billed as the greatest upset in NASCAR history. Sacks was driving an R&D car for Bill Gardner of Digard Racing. The team featured a volunteer pit crew. As the race went along, it became apparent that Sacks had a car capable of beating Bill Elliott, who had won seven superspeedway races up to that point in the season. As cars dropped out of the race, those pit crew members pitched in to help Sacks and his crew chief Gary Nelson. Sacks led 33 of the 160 laps and beat Elliott by more than a second. Brett Bodine (1 for 480): NASCAR’S celebrated pace car driver won his only Cup Series race in the 1990 First Union 400 at North Wilkesboro Speedway in North Carolina. Bodine may have benefited from a scoring snafu, which put him as the leader following a late caution, but he led the last 83 laps of the race with Larry Mcreynolds calling the shots in the pit box. Trevor Bayne (1 for 197): On the day before his 20th birthday, Bayne pulled off an incredible upset in the famed No. 21 Wood Brothers Racing Ford. The plan was for Bayne to push David Ragan to victory after a late caution. But Ragan passed Bayne, the race leader, before getting the green flag. Ragan was black-flagged and sent to the rear of the field. The last two laps produced a wild shootout between Bayne, Carl Edwards and David Gilliland. Somehow, Bayne prevailed. He is now out of racing.