The 1973 American 500 was a

NASCAR The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, LLC (NASCAR) is an American auto racing sanctioning and operating company that is best known for stock car racing. The privately owned company was founded by Bill France Sr. in 1948, and hi ...

Winston Cup Series The NASCAR Cup Series is the top racing series of the NASCAR, National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing (NASCAR). The series began in 1949 as the Strictly Stock Division, and from 1950 to 1970 it was known as the Grand National Division. ...

racing event that took place on October 21, 1973, at

North Carolina Motor Speedway Rockingham Speedway, formerly North Carolina Motor Speedway and later North Carolina Speedway is a racetrack located near Rockingham, North Carolina. It is also known as The Rock and previously hosted NASCAR Cup Series, NASCAR Xfinity Series, ...

in Rockingham, North Carolina. This event would mark the only instance that a NASCAR Cup Series season would end at Rockingham Speedway. Having a 43-car racing grid was a very infrequent case during this era of NASCAR racing. Today, it forms the mandated standards that NASCAR developed over the years. This is also the earliest in the year a Cup season has finished since the inaugural season in 1949, and the last time there have been no races in November. 1973 would become the "year of the smaller engine" while declining sponsorship interests for the drivers resulted in NASCAR keeping the bigger gas-guzzling engines from being abolished from the sport. Following this race, NASCAR started to tighten up on their pre-race inspections as a precautionary measure to ensure that only legal racing components are being used.

Background

North Carolina Motor Speedway is a closed racetrack located near Rockingham, North Carolina. It is affectionately known as "The Rock".

Race report

David Pearson David or Dave Pearson may refer to: * David Pearson (librarian) (born 1955), British librarian and scholar * David Pearson (racing driver) (1934–2018), American car racing champion * David Pearson (scientist) (born 1942), Canadian scientist, a ...

would defeat

Buddy Baker Elzie Wylie "Buddy" Baker Jr. (January 25, 1941 – August 10, 2015) was an American professional stock car racing driver and commentator. Over the course of his 33-year racing career, he won 19 races in the NASCAR Cup Series, including the 198 ...

by at least one lap after nearly four hours and fifteen minutes of racing. While the green flag was waved at noon, the checkered flag wasn't officially waved until 4:15 PM.''1973 American 500''
racing information at Racing Reference An incredible number of people would show up for the race; exactly 48,000 people would see 20 different lead changes and five caution flags for a staggering distance of 36 laps. While the average speed of the race was ,

Richard Petty Richard Lee Petty (born July 2, 1937), nicknamed "The King", is an American former stock car racing driver who raced from 1958 to 1992 in the former NASCAR Grand National and Winston Cup Series (now called the NASCAR Cup Series), most notabl ...

would clinch the

pole position In a motorsports race, the pole position is usually the best and "statistically the most advantageous" starting position on the track. The pole position is usually earned by the driver with the best qualifying times in the trials before the rac ...

in qualifying for his amazing run that reached . Pearson ended the 1973 NASCAR Winston Cup Series season with 18 starts and 11 wins. Every time Pearson was running at the end of a race he finished either 1st, 2nd, or 3rd while leading led 2,658 of 5,338 laps in the process. The complete racing grid was 43

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...

-born drivers; including the last-place finisher Frank Warren who crashed on lap 13 out of the 492 laps that made up the advertised distance. Benny Parsons would return to the track after being a part of that lap 13 crash which destroyed the whole right side of his car. Travis Carter, his crew and volunteers, including Ralph Moody and his staff of 20 people managed to complete repairs to Parsons's car in an hour and eight minutes. They had to replace a rear axle, rear suspension, sidebars, braking system, and roll bar cage, cannibalizing parts from a car that did not qualify for the race. He was able to return to the race 136 laps down, to cheers. Parsons would encounter some vibration issues on lap 308 that would knock him out of the race. Even with the DNF, he would slide into a comfortable 28th-place finish. Only manual transmission vehicles were allowed to participate in this race; a policy that NASCAR has retained to the present day. Other notable drivers in this race included

Darrell Waltrip Darrell Lee Waltrip (born February 5, 1947) is an American motorsports analyst, author, former national television broadcaster, and stock car driver. He raced from 1972 to 2000 in the NASCAR Cup Series (known as the NASCAR Winston Cup Series dur ...

Elmo Langley Elmo Harold Langley (August 21, 1928 – November 21, 1996) was a NASCAR driver and owner. Langley primarily used the number 64 on his race cars during his NASCAR career. Racing career Langley began his racing career racing modified cars in Vir ...

, and

Richard Childress Richard Childress (born September 21, 1945 in Winston-Salem, North Carolina) is an American former race car driver in NASCAR. As the owner of Richard Childress Racing (RCR), he became one of the wealthiest men in North Carolina. In 2004, he opene ...

(now the owner of

Richard Childress Racing Richard Childress Racing (RCR) is an American professional stock car racing team that currently competes in the NASCAR Cup Series and the NASCAR Xfinity Series. The team is based in Welcome, North Carolina, and is owned and operated by Richard ...

). Eddie Bond, John Sears, and

Paul Tyler Paul may refer to: *Paul (given name), a given name (includes a list of people with that name) *Paul (surname), a list of people People Christianity * Paul the Apostle (AD c.5–c.64/65), also known as Saul of Tarsus or Saint Paul, early Chri ...

would retire from NASCAR after this racing event. Souvenir racing programs were sold at the event for the then-inexpensive cost of $2 USD per copy ($ when adjusted for inflation). Benny Parsons would eventually win the Winston Cup Championship after this race by a mere 67 points over runner-up

Cale Yarborough William Caleb "Cale" Yarborough (born March 27, 1939) is an American former NASCAR Winston Cup Series driver and owner, businessman, and farmer. He is one of only two drivers in NASCAR history to win three consecutive championships, winning in 1 ...

.''1973 Winston Cup Recap''
at How Stuff Works Even though Parsons would finish in 28th during the race in his

Chevrolet Chevrolet ( ), colloquially referred to as Chevy and formally the Chevrolet Motor Division of General Motors Company, is an American automobile division of the American manufacturer General Motors (GM). Louis Chevrolet (1878–1941) and ous ...

Chevelle Laguna machine, Yarborough's third-place finish would not earn him enough points to overtake the championship lead. Individual race winnings for this event varied in grandeur from the winner's share of $16,795 ($ when adjusted for inflation) to the last-place finisher's share of $485 ($ when adjusted for inflation). NASCAR officials allowed a grand total of $99,715 to be given to the finishers of this racing event ($ when adjusted for inflation).Racing information for the ''1973 American 500''
at Fantasy Racing Cheat Sheet

Qualifying

Top 10 finishers

References

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American 500 The Pop Secret Microwave Popcorn 400 was a NASCAR Winston Cup Series event that took place in November at the North Carolina Motor Speedway from 1965 to 2003. It was the first NASCAR Cup Series victory for three drivers including Mark Martin in 1 ...

NASCAR races at Rockingham Speedway