The early sixties was a time of rapid change in stock car racing with engines getting bigger and cars getting more aerodynamic leading to new names to replace the old guard that was retiring, one way or the other.1962 marked the year that one of stock car racing's most successful car builders began his transition from driver to car owner. But if Banjo Matthews' remarkable side by side run with Fred Lorenzen in the closing stages of the '62 Atlanta 500 was any indication, there was no question that Mr. Edwin Matthews was still on top of his game as a driver in '62. Banjo teamed up with another legendary racer, Smokey Yunick, in 1963 to field one of the new "porcupine" engine Chevrolets that left Ford wondering what happened to their new dominant "fastback" 427 racers that swept the Riverside 500. This potent black and gold Impala also carried Buck Baker and, a winner in his first Daytona race, Indy car driver Johnny Rutherford to good runs during the '63 season Another driver making news by changing brands was long time Pontiac driver Fireball Roberts. After winning every race he intered at Daytona in 1962 in Pontiacs, with the GM pullout and the "Big Indians" getting a little too big, Roberts came home to Ford for the '63 season. It was a good move as he won his first race back in a Ford plus a second Southern 500 victory as Fireball seemed right at home in the new slippery "fastback" body with it's new cross bolted main 427 cubic engine racing engine. But the real story was this big hunk of "white lightning" from the shop of legendary car builder Ray Fox teaming with storied whiskey runner Junior Johnson to give Ford officials ulcers. After Ford's big win at Riverside, the blazing speeds shown by the new Chevrolets would have sent Ford back to the drawing board if the Chevys had shown more durablity. Fox and Johnson fought parts shortages and no factory support all season but still managed some wins, including a repeat at Charlotte Motor Speedway's National 500, after having won it in a Pontiac the previous year.