In the summer of 1961, NASCAR's Grand National division raced on back-to-back days - June 23rdin Hartsville, South Carolinaand a day later on June 24th at Starkey in Roanoke, Virginia. Then the teams turned south to head for Daytona Beach to run the third annual Firecracker 250 ten days later on July 4th. Well, most of them anyway.
Several GN regulars - including Elmo Langley, Wendell Scott, Richard Petty, Jim Paschal, Jim Reed and Doug Yates - continued their trek north to race in a NASCAR Eastern Late Model division race a Lincoln Speedway in New Oxford, PA on July 1st.
Though records are not clear about how qualifying went, two heat races were held to apparently set the starting order. Petty and Hoss Kagle won the two heats to put them on the front row for the 100-lap feature.
The wins by Petty and Kagle in the preliminary heats were indicative of how things would go in the main event. Kagle pursued Petty's 43 Plymouth for much of the race. With 11 laps to go, however, Kagle blew a tire and hit the pits for service.
With Kagle's late race misfortune, the King cruised the remaining laps to claim the win. Jim Paschal took over second from Kagle and stayed there. Jim Reed finished third. Langley and Scott rounded out the top five finishers.
Read on for more:
http://bench-racing.blogspot.com/2015/07/july-1-1961-richard-pettys-lost.html
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Schaefer: It's not just for racing anymore.
updated by @tmc-chase: 05/08/19 12:49:53PM
