Daytona has seen joy, sorrow
Across six decades, the Daytona 500 has produced great finishes, built the foundation for future superstars, ignited numerous controversies and cost the sport perhaps its most iconic figure.
Approaching the 60th running of NASCAR’s biggest race, here are five unforgettable moments from “The Great American Race.”
1976: David Pearson and Richard Petty, giants of the sport in the mid-1970s, meet on the high ground on the race’s final lap. With the checkered flag in sight, they collide in Turn 4, both cars hitting the outside wall and spinning onto the grass next to the frontstretch. Pearson alertly pushes the clutch on his car to keep the engine running, returns to the track in his battered Mercury and wins the race, crossing the finish line at about 30 mph.
1979: It was the day the sport changed forever. With CBS broadcasting the race live from flag to flag for the first time, the finish was one made for the movies. Donnie Allison and Cale Yarborough crashed entering Turn 3 while racing for the lead on the last lap. Their cars limped to a stop on the infield grass. Bobby Allison, who stopped at the scene to check on his brother, sparked a fight that also involved Donnie and Cale. Meanwhile, Richard Petty, who was running third, inherited the win, his sixth in the 500.
1959: The first Daytona 500 was the culmination of NASCAR founder Bill France Sr.’s audacious project — the building of a giant 2.5-mile speedway when nothing remotely similar existed in the stock car racing world. The first race gave the idea a big start. Lee Petty and Johnny Beauchamp finished the marathon side by side, with the lapdown car of Joe Weatherly alongside. Beauchamp was originally declared the winner, but France studied photographs and film of the finish for three days and awarded the victory to Petty. The publicity helped establish the race — and the track.
1998: Dale Earnhardt Sr. had won everything at Daytona except the big one. His frustration reached the point that, after one 500, he talked about the probability that he would never win his sport’s biggest event. He drove out of that valley in 1998, winning in spectacular fashion, ending a 20-year drought and sparking a post-race celebration that has rarely been rivaled.
2001: It was the saddest 500. Dale Earnhardt Sr. died in a last-lap crash, moments before his teammate, Michael Waltrip, won the race. Earnhardt’s death put NASCAR on national magazine covers and increased scrutiny of safety in the sport, leading to a series of improvements. Although dozens of drivers have died in a variety of races at Daytona International Speedway, Earnhardt was the first to perish in the 500. There have been no driver deaths in NASCAR since his accident.