There were several exciting races from which to choose for this date's History Minute, but I choose the 1962 Old Dominion 500 from Martinsville as a followup to the Minute from yesterday wherein we discussed Fred Lorenzen's fascination with the rear bumpers of his competitors. In yesterday's Minute he prevailed. Today, not so.
Thirty-seven cars started the 500 laps on the half-mile track in Martinsville, VA. Fireball Roberts in the Banjo Matthews Pontiac snagged the pole with a speed of 71.513 mph. Joe Weatherly in his Bud Moore Pontiac would start second, Nelson Stacy in a Holman-Moody Ford third, Fred Lorenzen in another Holman-Moody Ford fourth and Junior Johnson in the Ray Fox Pontiac would roll of fifth.
Fireball led the first 102 laps before Lorenzen took over for 3 laps. Nelson Stacy went in front for the first time on lap 107 but stayed there only two lapsbefore Joe Weatherly shoved his Pontiac out front. Weatherly would give it up to Nelson Stacy on lap190 and Stacy would steadily pull away from his competitors to win the race by a little more than three laps.
While Stacy was making light of his competition Fred Lorenzen was making "friends and influencing people" in his run for the front. Just short of 100 laps, while running third, Freddie played bumper-tag with his teammate Stacy and moved Stacy to take number two position on the track behind Fireball.
The first of two cautions came out for a minor spin and that put Freddie right on the bumper of the Roberts' Pontiac for the restart. When the green flag waved, Fred went to work on the back bumper of the Pontiac. Bam, Bam, Bam, over and over but Fireball wasn't moved. After several laps of the bumping, the two cars were coming off turn two when Fireball slammed on his brakes. Without time to react, Lorenzen drove his Ford radiator deep into the back end of that Pontiac. Lorenzen was done for the day as the water drained from the busted radiator.
Banjo Matthews, owner of Fireball's car was not at all happy with Lorenzen. He called Lorenzen's actions "unnecessary antics". After the race, Fireball was less kind stating "I warned Freddie by shaking my finger at him. that must have made him mad because he waved his finger back at me. I waved my hand at him and told him to lay off but he kept it up. I didn't tell him again because I knew how to get him off of me". Lorenzen departed the track and was not available for comment so we don't know his response.
Nelson Stacy average 66.874 mph with only 2 caution flags to slow the pace. A crowd of 11,500 was on hand to see Stacy win, Fireball practice tail-gating responses, and Lorenzen experiencing the consequences of following too closely. Go back and read the Minute for yesterday and you will see that Fred learned how to avoid such embarrassing situations, thanks to Fireball.
Top five finishers:
1. Nelson Stacy, Holman-Moody Ford, winning $3,655.00
2. Richard Petty, Petty Engineering Plymouth, winning $1,650.00 (3 laps down)
3. Ned Jarrett, B.G. Holloway Chevrolet, winning $1,500.00 (4 laps down)
4. Jack Smith, Smith Pontiac, winning $850.00 (5 laps down)
5. Joe Weatherly, Bud Moore Pontiac, winning $920.00 (5 laps down)
Sixth through tenth were Darel Dieringer, Fireball Roberts, Jimmy Pardue, Jim Paschal and Bob Welborn. Tiny Lund finished 12th, Buddy Baker 13th, Sherman Utsman 14th, Junior Johnson 17th, Wendell Scott 19th and Larry Frank 22nd. Finishing 24th was Stick Elliott with PAUL LEWIS in 26th. Rex White was 27th, and Lorenzen, out of the race on lap 108 is credited with 29th. G. C. Spencer was 30th, Johnny Allen 32nd, Marvin Panch 33rd, Fred Harb 34th, Curtis Crider 36th and E.J. Trivette finished last in 37th position after having to park his Chevy on lap 29 when his brakes failed.
PERSONAL NOTE: Several of the men who competed in this race will be in attendance at The Celebration of the Automobile this coming Saturday, September 28th, in Hillsborough, NC, at the Occoneechee/Orange Speedway. You can get the first hand stories at the event. Admission is free, the experience in priceless! Check the "Events Calendar" here on the site for more information. I highly promote this event as this will be my fifth year in attendance and from the very first minute I drove onto that facility five years ago, my experiences have been amazing and awesome, even last year when it poured rain all day Saturday. I hope many of you will come out Saturday. Weather this year is supposed to be awesome, 80 degrees and sunshine!
Honor the past, embrace the present, dream for the future
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What a change! It's been awhile since I've checked in and I'm quite surprised. It may take me awhile to figure it our but first look it's really great.
updated by @tim-leeming: 12/05/16 04:00:58PM
