The GN series was scheduled to race on July 27, 1951 at Monroe County Fairgrounds in Rochester NY, but rains begin to fall after the green flag waved. Because the next race was scheduled for 2 days later in Asheville-Weaverville, the decision was made to postpone the race until July 31. Then an interesting decision was made. Rather than restart the race at the point the rains fell, the decision was made to re-run the ENTIRE race. The line-up for the 2nd attempt was set based on how the cars were running at the time the race was postponed 4 days earlier.
NASCAR was only in its 3rd year for the GN series. So I guess I'll cut them some slack for calling an audible or two.
So the teams hauled their gear back to the south to race in North Carolina. Then a few of them drove back to upstate New York two days after A-W to run the rescheduled Rochester event. And this was before interstates, McDonald's, Cracker Barrels, Stuckey's and state-provided rest stops (unless you consider a cluster of trees along the side of a Federal highway a state-provided rest stop).
Lee was one of the few who returned to Rochester. On the 2nd trip home, he had a trophy in the front seat with him. The win turned out to be his only victory of the 1951 season.
Read on for more.
http://bench-racing.blogspot.com/2013/07/july-31-1951-lee-petty-rolls-in.html
Special thanks to Dorris at Williamson County Public Library in Tennessee. She helped arrange the transfer of microfilm for the Rochester Democrat Chronicle from New York State Library to ours so I could browse through the reels and grab several article scans.
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Schaefer: It's not just for racing anymore.
updated by @tmc-chase: 12/05/16 04:00:58PM
