Pete Hamilton

posted by admin on October 29, 2011

Pete Hamilton

“The Gentleman Racer”, Pete Hamilton was born in the city of Newton, Massachusetts and was born on the 20th July 1942. He has always had a love of cars and this love was heightened when he started working in a service station after school when he was in the third grade at school. He first started racing stock cars in 1962 at the Norwood Arena at the age of nineteen. He moved up to Hobby Stocks and a few other divisions before trying his hand in the Modified Division. By 1965 Pete had become the Thompson’s World Series Twin 50’s Champion and went on to win the NASCAR National Sportsman Championship in 1967 driving the #69 car owned by Worcester Sand and Gravel.

At the end of the 1967 season Pete decided to move down south and take a shot at the NASCAR Grand National “Rookie of the Year” honours. In his third start, the Tidewater 259 at Langley Field Speedway he finished fifth and later that year he came in second behind Richard Petty at the Smoky Mountain Raceway at Maryville, Tennessee. He competed in sixteen out of a possible forty nine events. In his debut year he earned himself three Top 5 and six Top 10 finishes, was ranked at thirty two in the final point standings and won the coveted 1968 “Rookie of the Year” honours. The following year, 1969 he won twelve out of twenty six Grand American Division, a division for smaller cars such as the Pontiac Firebird and the Chevrolet Camaro, events and won the series championship.

More success was to follow in 1970 when he had his greatest victory, after starting in ninth position he went on to win the Daytona 500 whilst driving the #40 Superbird for Petty Enterprises. He won both of the events that he entered at the Talladega Superspeedway, the Alabama 500 and the Talladega 500 and had his fourth victory for the year at Daytona International Speedway driving for Cotton Owens. This was to be his final career victory on the super speedways. For the 1970season Pete made sixteen starts and recorded four victories, one pole, ten Top 5’s and twelve Top 10’s driving Plymouth Superbirds. Pete was the first driver to win $100,000 on a super speedway in a single season. Towards the end of the season Chrysler/Dodge pulled its financial support from NASCAR and this meant that Petty Enterprises could no longer afford to field all of the intended cars and unfortunately Pete’s #40 was not in the allocated budget so Pete lost his ride.

In 1971 driving the #6 Plymouth for Cotton Owens, he won his Daytona Twin 125 qualifier but engine failure prevented Pete from taking part in the Daytona 500. He qualified on the pole for the Yankee 400 at Michigan International Speedway but once again engine failure prevented him from completing the race. Qualifying again on the pole for the Teas 500 at College Station in Texas the engine held out and Pete finished in fourth position. He had six engine failures during the 1971 season but despite this he still managed to record two poles, eleven Top 5’s and twelve Top 10’s in twenty two starts.

Although he was at the pinnacle of his career Pete retired from full time racing at the end of the 1971 season as he had a recurring problem with a neck injury that he sustained in a 1969 Grand American race. Driving the #5 Plymouth in five events for Housby Racing in 1972 Pete had three engine failures, crashed in the fourth and finally went on to finish fifth in the American 500 at Rockingham in North Carolina, recording his only Top 5 for the year. In 1973 Pete entered into two events, lost an engine in both and failed to score a Top 10 finish.

He retired from racing that year and started up a successful car building business. He did return in 1975 to run the Rattler 100 at the Twin City Speedway (now the South Alabama Speedway. He set a new track record of 16.50 when he qualified and then dominated the race to go on to victory. Pete made 64 NASCAR Grand National (now Nextel Cup) starts with impressive results. He scored 33 Top Ten finishes, 26 Top Fives, and 4 Wins along with 3 Pole Positions. Pete and his wife, Suzy, now live part of the year in the Florida Keys where they enjoy water sports such as diving, snorkelling and boating and the summer months are spent in Maine.

References:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pete_Hamilton

http://www.legendsofnascar.com/Pete_Hamilton.htm

http://realracinusa.com/racelog/jane-smith-racing-column/a-legend-named-pete-hamilton/