27 Years Ago This Week I Sponsored Three Different Car Owners/Drivers at Riverside - The Least Known Finished Best

Race #30, the final race of the 1984 NASCAR Winston Cup season was held at the long gone Riverside, California road course on November 18, 1984. Riverside was a favorite trip for most of the stock car racing community. Some still made the cross country trip by motor vehicle.

The 1984 Winston Western 500 was the final NASCAR race of my first year as Motorsports Coordinator for 7-Eleven Stores / Southland Corporation. I made the trip by air from Dallas, Texas to Riverside to coordinate sponsorship of a very unusual 3-car 7-Eleven set of entries.

Kyle Petty had suffered through a disastrous season at Petty Enterprises and we had already inked a deal to move him to the famed Wood Brothers Team of Stuart, Virginia for 1985. Earlier in the year I had met Winston West rookie Derrike Cope of Spanaway, Washington and his car owner, George Jefferson of Yakima - a bearded lumberman in a ten gallon hat. We met because they provided a car for Kyle to drive in a Winston West road course race at Kent (Seattle), Washington and I was so impressed I started sponsoring their Winston West team (I am listening to Bill Deal & the Rhondells on Shag City USA Radio as I type - go Jeff and Dustin). At the same time we were sponsoring future Indy 500 winner Bobby Rahal in Indy cars for Jim Trueman who owned Red Roof Inns and Mid-Ohio Race Course. Bobby was also co-driving the IMSA Ford Probe Prototype for 7-Eleven with Klaus Ludwig and Doc Bundy prepared by Zakspeed/Roush(yep, Jack, pre-NASCAR).

We (7-Eleven) had a brainstorm and approached the Wood Brothers and Bobby Rahal. Why don't we start our Wood Brothers(who hadn't planned to run Riverside) sponsorship one race early and put 7-Eleven colors on the car at Riverside with Bobby Rahal, a road course driving star,behind the wheel? Team Manager, Eddie Wood said ok and so did Bobby. Well Bobby had never driven a NASCAR stock car. I don't think he had ever seen a NASCAR stock car race. Bobby was well educated, well read, quiet spoken, had a great sense of humor and was married to a twin who I couldn't tell from her sister. Coincidently, Eddie Wood was also married to a twin, so he and Bobby had something in common.

We had tons of west coast guestson hand to see our 3 car effort - Derrike in the #95 George Jefferson T-bird(it was a combined Winston West/Winston Cup race), Kyle Petty in his #7 T-bird making his final Petty Enterprises start, and Bobby Rahal in the Wood Brothers #21, all decked out in red/white/blue 7-Eleven sponsorship.

Have you ever seen two men just immediately hit it off? That was Leonard Wood and Bobby Rahal. They bonded so well and really liked each other. Bobby said the typical road race driver stuff to Leonard - the car had no power, no brakes and no steering and Leonard just ate it up because they really liked each other. The Wood Brothers had come to Riverside with some new-fangled chrome wheels which proved to be a disaster. After marking the wheels and tires with yellow chalk, Leonard discovered the tires literally wouldn't stay in place on the chrome wheels and tended to spin forward under braking. Leonard showed his research to Bill Gazaway and Dick Beatty andchrome wheels were subsequently banned for a long time in NASCAR.

Anyway, Bobby Rahal took that old taxicab of a stock car and qualified it 20th - not bad for a guy at his first NASCAR race. Unfortunately, the rear end didn't hold up for Bobby and he was out after 44 laps finishing next to last with a 40th place finish. But, the chemistry between Leonard Wood and Bobby Rahal, a true driving talentwas magical. Bobby loved hearing Leonard describe pitting Jimmy Clark of Scotland when he won at Indy. It was Bobby Rahal's only NASCAR start.

Kyle didn't fare much better, suffering transmission problems, losing laps fixing it, and posting a 28th place finish in his last Petty Enterprises outing, appropriately 21 laps down before moving to the Wood Brothers.

The day's biggest surprise for the 7-Eleven guests was young Winston West rookie Derrike Cope who went out against the "big boys" and finished 18th, best of the 7-Eleven sponsored driving trio.6 years later Cope would stand in victory lane at the 1990 Daytona 500.

To me, the most notable stat of the day was watching one of my true heros, Hershel McGriff of Bridal Veil, Oregon put down a top-10 finish on the lead lap in his Gary Smith owned Winston West Pontiac. Hershel was 56 years old by gawd. When we talk of iron men in racing, Hershel heads the class.

Geoff Bodine in his Rick Hendrick/Harry Hyde rookie season for Rick won again and Terry Labonte took home the championship for Billy Hagan, another really niceman I miss.

It was an interesting weekend and the only time I was ever involved with the sponsorship of three teams in the same race.3 of the nicest drivers I was ever around, and all on the same weekend 27 years ago this week.

Do love me some of dem chrome wheels.

Thanks, TMC. That's dem chrome wheels, all right! That's a very historic photo you have put up.The only Bobby Rahal NASCAR start and for the Wood Brothers, no less. It was an interesting weekend.

Two points. First- was the paint scheme on that car coincidental? I know it's VERY similiar to the Valvoline scheme Buddy Baker ran for the Wood Bros. in 83 and 84, and close to the one Cale Yarborough used in 81-82 with M.C. Anderson. As a matter of fact- Kyle used the scheme in '85 as well before it was revamped for 1986- the '86 car was my personal favorite of the 7-Eleven cars.

Second point- I know that Riverside was built in a place that was more condusive to real estate/shopping area in Southern California. But I also think Riverside was a REAL racer's track, and maybe the ultimate road course. It offered high speeds, technical cornering (turn 5 and the turn 8 hairpin), and my favorite...turn 9. I'm surprised to this day that someone hasn't tried to rebuild the course somewhere else. Sonoma (Infineon) for me has been ruined by all of the reconfiguration- it races too much like Martinsville, and while Watkins Glen can be fun at times, it's just too narrow in too many places to allow for many passes unless you do it underbraking into the inner loop or into turn 1.

There are similarities to the Valvoline scheme, but coincidental and not deliberate. 7-Eleven had previously used its green and orange colors on Kyle's car. They looked terrible. I agree about Riverside. I couldn't believe when Bruton destroyed the carousel, etc. there. The big negative about Riverside was the darned air polution that backed up there. Some days you couldn't even see the mountains.

Thanks Dave! Those chrome wheels don't look bad at all. I remember Waltrip ran them about 3 years ago n his cars, but I don't notice them any more.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder I suppose. For me, I preferred the orange/green look on KP's car. Again, the chrome wheels - Boom! - though I'm not sure it ever ran a race with them. The white wheels helped the look - but the black ones ehh not so much.

I thought the red-white-blue schemes run on the Petty car in 84 and again through the Woods years as 7-11 and later Citgo were too similar to others & didn't give his car a unique look.

Sadly, KP's performances during that period weren't particularly unique either - regardless of how the car was painted.

Wonderful memories! Thank you for sharing.

mwr has them on all their cars dont they

Gonna have to disagree on this one regarding the orange and green. I still gag when I see the paint scheme above. When I was at Wrangler there were only two cars (in my opinion) on the track that visibly popped out on the backstretch at Daytona and Talladega, as well as on tv- Richard Petty's STP Red and Petty Blue combination and Dale Earnhardt's Wrangler Reflex Blue and yellow. In late 1983 Southland Corp. (7-Eleven) inked a partnership deal with Ford, that included moving Kyle to a Ford. Ford's motorsports agency, Campbell & Co. (the folks who provided all the Ford pit notes at NASCAR races) actually designed all the vehicles that included not only Kyle's T-bird, but the Bob Glidden and Billy Meyer dragsters, Ford IMSA Probe and Jack Roush Trans-Am cars, Indy cars and hydroplane. Unfortunately, at the time, Kyle's biggest obstacle was operating out of the nearly dead Petty Enterprises compound. There were few employees left and morale was low. At Bristol in 1984, Kyle actually got out of the car and helped on a pit stop, assisted by Pattie and the 7-Eleven clown in his clown outfit. That about summed up the state of Petty Enterprises, unfortunately. I campaigned internally to have the 7-Eleven clown banned from being pitside at races and won that small battle. I felt like I had won a war when we got Kyle out of Level Cross and into the Wood Bothers ride. I will say in Kyle's defense, he put in some very long hours (he was also trying to sing) under harsh conditions. The late Lee Petty was not a pleasant person to have come by and offer his critique. I have never worked with a driver any more cooperative or any nicer than Kyle. He always went the extra, unasked mile for you.

Back to your original premise though - the red/white/blue definitely wasn't unique, but at least to us it wasn't green and orange.

The more I think about it and look at it, I have to agree that Ford's "artist" had to have had a really good look at the MC Anderson and Wood Brothers Valvoline paint schemes. Way too similar. If I was Valvoline, I would have screamed bloody murder. In 1981 Hardee's showed up at Talladega in May for the Winston 500 with a car that had the exact design scheme as our Dale Earnhardt Wrangler car, right down to the width and spacing of the chevrons. We got a court injuncrtion to prevent the car from racing in future events with our copyrighted design and T. Wayne Robertson of RJR refused to let the Hardee's show car with the copycat design participate in the prerace parade.

Back to my comments on what a shambles Petty Enterprises was in 1984, remember that Richard was at Mike Curb with Buddy Parrott winning his 200th and Dale Inman was with Terry Labonte and Billy Hagan winning the Championship while Kyle struggled. NASCAR was aware of the struggles of a potential big money spending sponsor and "recruited" me from Wrangler for the job at 7-Eleven. I went on the payroll at the beginning of 1984 Speedweeks. Petty Enterprises could hardly get a car ready for Daytona. Things were so bad that Kyle borrowed a Dick Brooks Chameleon Sunglasses T-bird from Junie Donlavey in Richmond to shoot a photo for the 1984 NASCAR program ads. If you look at the photo I am posting below, you'll see that the car has no windshield, only a partial paint job and the "Chameleon" logo of the Brooks/Donlavey car sponsor very visible on the driver's headrest behind Kyle's head. It was a tough way to start the season. I tried to spread some of the 7-Eleven NASCAR program away from Kyle by having the 7-Eleven Miles Leader Award, the 7-Eleven Twin 125 Daytona qualifying races and the 7-Eleven Busch race at Richmond. The 7-Eleven NASCAR program improved considerably when Kyle moved to the Wood Brothers. That kid never really got the credit he deserved for persevering against near insurmountable odds.

"... better than most of the boobs we see on the tube today..."

What?? Man oh man, maybe I should start watching racing on TV again. I had no idea this kind of entertainment was being offered now. haha

Here are the schemes you are comparing Dave...

Thanks, Jay. That is correct.

Great Story Dave was that the same weekend that GA Gean Felton had a bad act on Sat in a Trans AM Race

Leon,

I don't know. Sorry.

1983 #7 Kyle Petty (orange and lime colors of 7-11) Pontiac uniform

Nov.18,1984 Bobby Rahal and Leonard Wood 7-11 #21 Ford Riverside International Raceway
Winston Western 500

Nov.18,1984 #04 Hershel McGriff (Mark C. Bloom Pontiac) racing behind #22 Bobby Allison (Miller High Life Buick) race car. Riverside International Raceway
Winston Western 500

Kyle Petty #7 Eleven Ford Thunderbird at Bristol 8-25-1984
started 24th - finished 24th 182 laps behind

For those of you who may have been doubtful when I said in an earlier post above that at one time there was a 7-Eleven Clown and he helped on a Kyle Petty pit stop at Bristol, here is a photo of the 7-Eleven Clown in the mini-Kyle Petty Orange/Green 7-Eleven car at Atlanta. The photo was taken by our member Rober Turner and is posted on his profile page with his other photos.

Great story Dave.

I did some research on them and turns out the chrome wheels used today aren't chrome, or even chrome plated. They use a process called anodization to apply aprotective layer of oxide to the wheels by electrolysis and can be any color, including chrome or gold.

On April 10, 2014, Bobby Rahal's son, Indy Car driver, Graham Rahal posted to Twitter the same photo posted by TMC-Chase on November 16, 2011. His Tweet was then re-tweeted by Wood Brothers Racing. Petty cool. But remember - YOU SAW IT & HEARD IT FIRST AT STOCK CAR RACERSREUNION !!!

Great job, as always Dave!