When Dover Debuted a Concrete Surface and the Subsequent Painting of the Blue Line

The question came up on the Racing Through History broadcast Tuesday night as to when the concrete surface replaced asphalt at Dover.

The answer is 1995 ( just yesterday to me ) and last year I wrote about some problems the drivers had with the new surface blending with the white walls.

Here's a partial and edited recap of that post:

I haven't been to a hockey game in a good while, but I do remember two "blue lines" under the ice at all hockey rinks. You experts correct me, but I recall them being used to establish offsides penalties if players beat the puck across it?

Doesn't really matter, but I was reminded of the Blue Line when I read about the Barry Dodson/Kyle Petty win at Dover in 1995.

I'm not sure the various stories mentioned it, but that 1995 Dover race was the first Cup race on the new Dover concrete surface.

I was at Dover that June weekend and the new white concrete surface was near blinding in bright sunlight. The wall was stark white and bright. It was so bright and white, in fact, that cars in Friday practice and qualifying and in the Saturday Busch Series race kept hitting the white concrete walls (no SAFER barriers) because drivers couldn't determine where the white concrete track ended and the white concrete wall began. Drivers and car owners made a real fuss to NASCAR.

On Sunday race day morning, as was my custom, I arrived in the very early wee hours to the Dover track to beat the traffic and get a prime parking spot. I always got a special parking pass from NASCAR at Dover that let me park on the horse track ( remember, the track was still "Dover Downs" - not Dover International) and we tried to get as close to the gate and little steps that led straight down into the Winston Cup garage.

When I exited my car and walked down into the garage, I could see a crew of painters all around the Dover track. They were painting a blue line 6"-8" tall all around the base of the concrete retaining wall around the entire race track so drivers could determine where the track ended and the wall began.

I don't see quite as much of it around the track as used to be there, but it is still very evident in long stretches.

ESPN Photo

And that is how Dover got it's Blue Line. I should point out that the Dover blue line is a different shade of blue than the blue Armco guardrail at Watkins Glen or the blue walls at Phoenix. Just in case you ever noticed and wondered what that blue line at Dover was or why it was there.

By the way, the first Dover Cup (it was pre Winston and really a Grand National race) event took place in 1969. It was won by Richard Petty of Randleman, NC in a Petty Enterprises solid blue #43 FORD over Richmond, Virginia's late Sonny Hutchins driving fellow Richmonder, Junie Donlavey's Ford #90. Below is a photo of Richard and Sonny side-by-side on the old Dover asphalt backstretch in 1969. R.I.P. Sonny.

Photo from Delaware Today

1969 Mason-Dixon 300

NASCAR Grand National race number 29 of 54
Sunday, July 6, 1969 at Dover Downs International Speedway, Dover, DE
300 laps on a 1.000 mile paved asphalt track (300.0 miles)

Time of race: 2:35:28
Average Speed: 115.772 mph
Pole Speed: 130.43 mph Cautions: 4 for 27 laps
Margin of Victory: 6 laps +
Attendance: 22,000
Lead changes: 7

Glossary 1969 NASCAR Grand National results / 1969 standings

advertise here

Fin St # Driver Sponsor / Owner Car Laps Money Status Led
1 3 43 Richard Petty East Tenn. Motors (Petty Enterprises) '69 Ford 300 4,725 running 150
2 4 90 Sonny Hutchins Junie Donlavey '67 Ford 294 2,050 running 0
3 9 48 James Hylton Hylton Engineering (James Hylton) '69 Dodge 294 1,275 running 0
4 8 4 John Sears L.G. DeWitt '69 Ford 293 825 running 0
5 25 84 Elmo Langley Elmo Langley '68 Ford 287 725 running 0
6 7 15 Ed Hessert Ed Hessert '69 Plymouth 281 675 running 0
7 17 34 Wendell Scott Wendell Scott '67 Ford 277 650 running 0
8 10 25 Bill Champion Bill Champion '68 Ford 275 600 running 0
9 28 45 Bill Seifert Bill Seifert '68 Ford 273 585 running 0
10 13 47 Cecil Gordon Bill Seifert '68 Ford 273 595 running 0
11 27 19 Henley Gray Harry Melton '68 Ford 267 560 running 0
12 16 70 J.D. McDuffie J.D. McDuffie '67 Buick 265 575 running 0
13 29 44 George Ashbrook Giachetti Brothers (Richard Giachetti) '67 Chevrolet 262 540 running 0
14 32 06 Neil Castles Neil Castles '69 Dodge 261 530 running 0
15 2 98 LeeRoy Yarbrough Junior Johnson '69 Ford 223 620 crash 124
16 5 49 G.C. Spencer G.C. Spencer '68 Plymouth 210 560 engine 0
17 23 04 Ken Meisenhelder Ken Meisenhelder '67 Oldsmobile 183 500 rear end 0
18 12 76 Ben Arnold Don Culpepper '68 Ford 155 515 engine 0
19 18 0 Frank Warren Don Tarr '67 Chevrolet 128 505 engine 0
20 20 11 Roy Hallquist Roy Hallquist '68 Chevrolet 93 495 oil leak 0
21 30 57 Bobby Mausgrover Ervin Pruitt '67 Dodge 82 460 driveshaft 0
22 19 26 Earl Brooks Earl Brooks '67 Ford 71 475 engine 0
23 1 17 David Pearson Holman-Moody '69 Ford 65 890 crash 26
24 6 31 Buddy Young Fred Bear '67 Chevrolet 65 455 engine 0
25 31 9 Roy Tyner Roy Tyner '69 Pontiac 65 420 rear end 0
26 14 64 Dub Simpson Woodfield Ford (Elmo Langley) '68 Ford 62 440 overheating 0
27 22 40 Jabe Thomas Bill Champion '67 Ford 56 410 crash 0
28 24 82 George Davis Mack Sellers '67 Chevrolet 24 400 quit 0
29 11 03 Richard Brickhouse Dub Clewis '67 Plymouth 19 415 engine 0
30 21 23 Paul Dean Holt Don Robertson '67 Ford 7 380 engine 0
31 26 86 Ed Negre Neil Castles '67 Plymouth 2 370 ignition 0
32 15 25 James Cox Don Robertson '67 Plymouth 1 385 engine 0

Stats from Racing Reference

I'm overly-familiar with the blue Armco at Watkins Glen but I've never noticed the blue stripe at Dover. Thanks for filling me in!

I miss the days when NASCAR ran allowed several model years to run. It added variety that you don't see these days. Not that it would matter, we don't have annual styling changes anymore (I miss those too). Unless the 1969 race was highlighted on Bud Lindeman's Car And Track, I'm certain that I didn't see it. I definitely don't remember seeing Buicks and Oldsmobiles in the field during the thirty years that GM was laying low.

I was laying low in 1969 and not paying a lot of attention to NASCAR. Petty was in a Ford; who wanted to see that? They already had Pearson & Yarbrough, we needed some competition! Look at that filed and tell who had a chance to win but wasn't driving a Ford? I'm also reminded that James Hylton doesn't get enough credit . He ran real well in the championship for a couple of years and didn't have the factory support that others did.

In the 1st Dover race, the current backstretch was the frontstretch with the start/finish line just outside the windows of the casino. I believe they flipped the track so to speak after the first one. And that first one was held on ... July 6, 1969, two days and almost 1,000 miles away from the Firecracker 400 held on the 4th of July in Daytona. So while we're often frustrated with how NASCAR is managed today, the NASCAR brass of this era doesn't have the market cornered on stupid. Plenty of goober decisions were made back in the day.

Here is a link to the blog entry I posted about Richard Petty's win in that 1st Dover race.

http://bench-racing.blogspot.com/2012/07/july-6-this-day-in-petty-h...

And the first driver to win on Dover's concrete in 1995? Yep, another Petty connection: Kyle. His 8th and final Cup win.

Chase, I didn't realize that the first Dover Cup event used today's backstretch for the frontstretch. I was so tickled to see the partial photo of Sonny's #90 Donlavey Ford beside Richard that I didn't even notice the flagstand right there under my nose in front of the horse viewing area and Dover offices! And Chase, the building in the photo was definely not a casino... that didn't come until several decades later. The bottom portion of that building actually had horse stalls. Then thee was the enclosed, heated/air conditioned viewing area for the horse races. Denis McGlyn had his office in that building and the PR office was also still located there when I was dealing with the track in the 80s.

Interesting piece, Dave!

I just learned more about Dover in this post than I have learned watching races there on tv or reading about them. I didn't know about the blue line, nor did I know they had flipped the straightaways as Darlington did. I love taking this class on line. Just need to figure out how to add it to my college credits.

It's pretty cool how Richard and Kyle each won the first race on Dover's two incarnations.

I quite like that picture of the old asphalt Dover with lane markings. I wish they'd paint lane markings on tracks again. It looked cool and imparted a real sense of speed that you just don't get otherwise with most camera angles they use today to make sure the sponsor logos don't get blurred. Among active tracks, Pocono is the only one that has it and you sure can tell they're going fast because of them.

I'm not sure where I heard it but didn't the blue line start out as black first?

And I had no idea the straightaways were flipped either.

Yea, I think ARCA is the only top stock car series anymore that still has different year models running on the track.

Although, it is cool that you presently have both the Chevy Impala and the Camaro on track in the Nationwide Series.

I think the line was blue the first morning they painted it in 1995, but it could have been black.