Darrell Waltrip, after his 5th place finish in the Atlanta 500, November 4, 1979. (Wiki Commons - Bill Ferguson)

Born on the 5^th February 1947 Darrell Waltrip’s very successful racing career spanned over an incredible forty years, starting at the age of 12 years of age by driving go-karts.  During the next four years, together with his father, they built a 1936 Chevrolet Coupe that Darrell drove in a stock car race at a local dirt tract near their home in Owensboro, Kentucky.  The first race proved unsuccessful because he slammed the wall and badly damaged the coupe but he soon found asphalt where he was able to put his experience with go-karting to good use.  By the late 1960’s his success was noticed by P.B. Crowell, an owner/driver from Nashville who suggested that Darrell move to Nashville and drive at the Music City Motorplex at the Tennessee State Fairgrounds.  He did this and won two track championships, 1970 and 1973 and so started his professional career as a race car driver.

Over a period of twenty nine years (1972 -2000) Darrell won a total of eighty four races, was three times champion with the NASCAR Cup Series (1981, 1982 and 1985), five times winning the Coca-Cola 600, (1978, 1979, 1985, 1988 and 1989) and winner of 59 Cup series pole positions to give only the tip of his achievements.

As a race car driver he was extremely popular, twice winning NASCAR’s Most Popular Driver Award, three times he was “American Driver of the Year” and was NASCAR’s “Driver of the Decade”, was nominated for the inaugural NASCAR Hall of Fame induction class in 2010 and was named as one of NASCAR’s 50 Greatest Drivers.  This list is not exhausted.

While racing in Franklin Darrell, who was articulate and not afraid of the media, would appear on the local television to promote the current weeks racing, often making fun of the other drivers.  The interviews did not always go down well with the fans but the management saw it as a way of selling more tickets and Darrell receiving extra pay for his promotional skills.  He also worked with WSM radio host, Ralph Emery and this was to prove beneficial to him as he was later to substitute for Ralph in the 1980’s on his television show, Nashville Now.  The experience and notoriety he gained during this period was to help him into NASCAR’s big leagues.  During his time on the radio and television, and due to his aggressive driving, he was nicknamed “Jaws”.  Many commentators and sport columnists said that “you either love him or hate him” because of his “take no prisoners” and “win at all costs” aggressive attitude towards driving and his criticism of NASCAR together with defeating the more established drivers on the track.  It was during the Daytona 500 warm up (that he was expected to win) in February 1983 Darrell  was involved in a bad accident, fortunately only suffering concussion, but this was like a wake up call.  After the accident Darrell spent many years trying hard to repair the relationship with both fans and fellow drivers and in 1989 and 1990 he was voted “Most Popular Driver” by NASCAR fans.

It seems that Darrell epitomised the perfect example of what NASCAR desired in their drivers: – Articulate, able to speak with the media, good looking and had the driving skills that could take him to the top of his profession.

Now Darrell is a television race commentator with Fox Broadcasting and with Speed TV and is a columnist in Foxsports.com.  He is an author and currently lives in Franklin, Tennessee with his wife, Stevie and two daughters.

References

Darrell Waltrip – Wikipedia
Smoke wants to do it his way – Fox Sports

Bill Elliott 1985 NASCAR Champion (Courtsey of Ted Van Pelt via Wiki Commons)

Bill Elliott is probably the most popular NASCAR driver, having won the NASCAR Most Popular Driver Award sixteen times.  This is a record for the nomination which started on 1956 and invites fans throughout the United States to vote for their favourite driver.  Bill decided to withdraw his name for nomination in 2003 after winning the award in 2002.

Born William Clyde Elliott on the 8^th October 1955 in Dawsonville, Georgia he is the youngest of thee sons, Ernie, Dan and himself.  The family have lived in the town for many generations and his father, George, ran a lumber business.  His father loved racing and cars, particularly Fords, and created a speed shop and a Ford dealership in the town.  George Elliott encouraged his three sons to accompany him to the race track saying “I got my boys into racing because I wanted them to stay away from the back roads.  If they were going to be driving fact, I wanted them to do it in the right place”.  Before too long the boys were behind the wheel, driving at local events.  Bills parents recognised that he had a natural talent for the sport as he could be seen driving around the track at high speed with confidence and competence so they encouraged him to enter more races and in 1976 on 29^th February Bill entered his first Winston Cup race at the North Carolina Speedway.  Sometimes it was difficult to find the entry fee but the family always managed it and it paid off when Bill won his first pole on 10^th April 1981 at Darlington Raceway.  In 1982 Harry Melling, a business man, offered to sponsor him so that he could continue racing and in 1983 Bill started his first full season finding victory at the Riverside International Raceway in his 117^th Winston Race Cup.  As time passed his success grew and in 1985 he won 11 races, together with 11 poles before winning the first Winston Million in NASCAR history. His victory in winning the Daytona 500, the Winston 500 at Talladega (with a record average speed of 186.288MPH)  and the Southern 500 at Darlington gave him the million dollar prize bonus and one of his nicknames “Million Dollar Bill”, the other being “Awesome Bill from Dawsonville”. With this victory he was to become the second NASCAR driver to be featured on the cover of the Sports Illustrated.

In 1995 Bill started his own team while being sponsored by McDonalds.  Bill fielded his own team for the Winston Cup for five years, from 1995 to 2000 and although he failed to win a race during this time he managed to get two top ten finishes in the championship standings.  He sold his team in 2000 to Ray Evernham and began to drive #9 Dodge Dealers/UAW Dodge Intrepid in 2001,winning the pole for the 2001 Dayton 500, finishing in the top 5 in fifth place.

In 2005 Bill went into semi retirement having a reduced schedule of races.  He has been able to devote more time to his fans by scheduling a variety of fan events for them.  He has created the Bill Elliott Driver Development programme that operates from the Bill Elliott Racing shop in Dawsonville. GA to guide young drivers through the highs and lows of life in auto racing based on the principles of teamwork, strong work ethic and positive attitude.  He is also able to spend more time with his family.  It is said of Bill that although he is quiet and unpretentious he has amazed his fans with his brilliant ability through three cracking decades.  Bills autobiography “Awesome Bill from Dawsonville” was published by Harper Entertainment in 2006.

References

www.billelliott.com/about/biography.html

www.BillElliott.com

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Elliott