30 years ago, on May 17, 1981, I had the pleasure to be at the 500 mile Dover race working for Wrangler Racing -the Dale Earnhardt/Rod Osterlund sponsor, when one of the most popular wins in Cup history occurred - Jody Ridley piloting Junie Donlavey's #90 Ford T-bird to victory over all the factory teams. It was a wonderful afternoon for racing. 5 years ago, Tom Higgins did a great column on this feat, which I shall try to post. Being from Richmond, it was extra special to be at Donlavey's only Cup win.
The Junie-Jody Show
It's once again Dover's turn on the Nextel Cup tour, and that inevitably brings back warm memories of Junie Donlavey and Jody Ridley.
Twenty-five years ago in the Delaware track's spring event, the Mason-Dixon 500, the two combined for the only points race victory either ever scored.
And it proved to be one of the strangest triumphs that anyone has posted in the long, colorful history of NASCAR, dating to 1949.
With just 41 laps to go on the speedway nicknamed "The Monster Mile" Neil Bonnett held a two-lap lead over Cale Yarborough. Ridley and Bobby Allison trailed in third and fourth place, respectively, even more laps down.
Then the engine failed in Bonnett's Ford, owned and engineered by Donlavey's fellow Virginians, the Wood Brothers, Glen and Leonard.
Yarborough, driving for Georgian M.C. Anderson, appeared home free for the checkered flag, especially after building his lead to five laps over the now-second place Ridley.
Lo and behold, as the old saying goes, Yarborough's Buick engine blew with 20 laps left in the 500-mile race.
The late Bob Latford, a widely-respected public relations representative for various racing enterprises through the years and a noted NASCAR historian, often said this produced the nuttiest thing he ever saw in stock car racing.
"Cale was sitting in the garage area, smoke and oil pouring out of his car, yet he remained the leader on the scoreboard for several minutes," said Latford, shaking his head. "Jody had to go around the track six times before his and Junie's number, 90, was posted as the leader."
Georgian Ridley, a 38-year-old Winston Cup Series rookie, was flagged the winner in the Donlavey Ford.
Tears of delight flowed freely in Victory Lane.
The gentlemanly Donlavey, immensely popular among his peers, had been racing with NASCAR from the time Big Bill France organized the sanctioning body. And now, after 32 years, he had a checkered flag in a race at his sport's top level. He was was getting the big Dover trophy.
But wait a minute!
Not everyone was happy.
Bobby Allison, listed as the runnerup, and his team owner, Harry Ranier, were officially protesting that their Buick had won rather than finishing 22 seconds behind Ridley.
"We have no doubt that Jody Ridley was a lap down to us," said Ranier.
NASCAR officials pored over the sheets from a relatively rustic scoring system for going on a half-hour. Remember, they didn't have the present-day computer technology available to them at that time.
Donlavey was sweating.
"Waiting to find out what the ruling would be was the longest 30 minutes of my life," he would say later. "You just can never tell how these things are going to turn out."
NASCAR ruled in favor of Junie and Jody.
Then, officials did something strange and unexplained to this day.
They confirmed that for 50 laps during the race there had been what they called "scoring communications difficulty."
Regardless, they felt with certainty that the outcome decided upon was the correct one.
A week later the teams came to the track then known as Charlotte Motor Speedway for a race then named the World 600.
Rain poured down during their first day at the track, washing out a lot of the action.
Despite the dreary conditions, there was a rather constant parade of cheery competitors to the truck that transported the car owned by Junie Donlavey.
They came with hands outstretched to congratulate a beaming Junie and Jody. Included were drivers who had teamed with Junie through his many years--Ricky Rudd, Jimmy Hensley, Dick Brooks, Ron Hutcherson, Harry Gant and Dick Trickle among them.
It was a tremendously touching scene.
The triumph that day at Dover was the only major victory that Ridley was to score in 140 big-time starts.
It was the only one for Donlavey in approximately 725 starts, fifth-most among car owners on the all-time list.
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"Any Day is Good for Stock Car Racing"
updated by @dave-fulton: 12/05/16 04:02:07PM