Grand American 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 ...

sanctioned series of

pony car Pony car is an American car classification for affordable, compact, highly styled coupés or convertibles with a "sporty" or performance-oriented image. Common characteristics include rear-wheel drive, a long hood, a short decklid, a wide range ...

stock cars Stock car racing is a form of automobile racing run on oval tracks and road courses measuring approximately . It originally used production-model cars, hence the name "stock car", but is now run using cars specifically built for racing. It ori ...

. The series ran from 1968 until 1972. The series was called "Grand Touring" from 1968 to 1969.

History

The series formed in 1968 under the name "Grand Touring" as a competitor to USAC's Stock Car Division and SCCA's

Trans-Am Series The Trans-Am Series is a sports car racing series held in North America. Founded in 1966, it is sanctioned by the Sports Car Club of America (SCCA). Primarily based in the United States, the series competes on a variety of track types includ ...

. It held 19 events in 1968 and 35 events in 1969. It was renamed Grand American for the 1970 season, hosting 27 events. By the 1971 season, NASCAR saw a decline in sponsorship, fan attendance and participation by teams, with Grand American hosting only seven events and NASCAR occasionally inviting Grand American cars to Grand National events that were short on entries (after the embarrassment of only 14 cars entering Grand National's 1971 Space City 300). In 1972, the structure of NASCAR was completely changed. Winston took title sponsorship for the Grand National Series, which was renamed the Winston Cup Series. The extensive Grand National 48-race schedule of previous seasons was reduced to 31 by having all races at tracks under a 1/2 mile in length or 250 miles in event length moved to a new division called the

Grand National East Division The NASCAR Grand National East Series was a short-lived racing series created by NASCAR in 1972 to provide a second-tier series, below the Winston Cup Series, to provide races at tracks that had been removed from the former Grand National Series' ...

. Grand American and retired (as old as 1969) Grand National/Winston Cup cars were allowed to race in the new division. That series lasted from 1972 until 1973. The Grand American series held four events in 1972, its final season.

Cars

The series featured

Ford Mustang The Ford Mustang is a series of American automobiles manufactured by Ford. In continuous production since 1964, the Mustang is currently the longest-produced Ford car nameplate. Currently in its sixth generation, it is the fifth-best selli ...

Chevrolet Camaro The Chevrolet Camaro is a mid-size American automobile manufactured by Chevrolet, classified as a pony car. It first went on sale on September 29, 1966, for the 1967 model year and was designed to compete with the Ford Mustang. The Camaro share ...

AMC Javelin The AMC Javelin is an American front-engine, rear-wheel-drive, two-door hardtop automobile manufactured by American Motors Corporation (AMC) across two generations, 1968 through 1970 and 1971 through 1974 model years. The car was positioned an ...

Mercury Cougar Mercury Cougar is a nameplate applied to a diverse series of automobiles sold by the Mercury division of Ford from 1967 to 1997 and from 1999 to 2002. While the nameplate is most commonly associated with two-door coupes, at various times during ...

s and

Pontiac Trans Am The Pontiac Firebird is an American automobile that was built and produced by Pontiac from the 1967 to 2002 model years. Designed as a pony car to compete with the Ford Mustang, it was introduced on February 23, 1967, five months after GM's Che ...

s. Several Grand American cars were former

SCCA The Sports Car Club of America (SCCA) is a non-profit American automobile club and sanctioning body supporting road racing, rallying, and autocross in the United States. Formed in 1944, it runs many programs for both amateur and professional r ...

Trans-Am The Trans-Am Series is a sports car racing series held in North America. Founded in 1966, it is sanctioned by the Sports Car Club of America (SCCA). Primarily based in the United States, the series competes on a variety of track types includin ...

cars, extensively modified to meet the NASCAR safety rules and weight limits. Some drivers also used foreign cars such as

Porsche 911 The Porsche 911 (pronounced ''Nine Eleven'' or in german: Neunelfer) is a two-door 2+2 high performance rear-engined sports car introduced in September 1964 by Porsche AG of Stuttgart, Germany. It has a rear-mounted flat-six engine and origin ...

in the series' early years. The motors were initially restricted to a 305 cubic inch (5.0 liter) engine displacement. The 305 cubic inch limit eventually was increased to 366 cubic inch to help with performance and reliability of the Grand American cars.

Win controversies

In 1971, the money invested in NASCAR teams by American auto makers began to lessen as marketing and perceived consumer demand caused funds to shift away from NASCAR. The car entries for some of the top division

Grand National The Grand National is a National Hunt horse race held annually at Aintree Racecourse in Liverpool, England. First run in 1839, it is a handicap ...

events with smaller payouts shrank (only 14 cars entered the 1971 Space City 300) to the point that NASCAR allowed the Grand American cars to compete in certain Grand National races. Three of these Grand National races were won by drivers in Grand American cars;

Tiny Lund DeWayne Louis "Tiny" Lund (November 14, 1929 – August 17, 1975) was an American stock car racer. He was a journeyman racer-for-hire in the top level NASCAR Grand National Series, running partial seasons for a number of years, including a vict ...

(driving a Camaro in the Buddy Shuman 276 and the Wilkes 400) and

Bobby Allison Robert Arthur Allison (born December 3, 1937) is a former American professional stock car racing driver and owner. Allison was the founder of the Alabama Gang, a group of drivers based in Hueytown, Alabama, where there were abundant short track ...

(driving a Mustang in the Myers Brothers 250) used pony cars at flat tracks that favored the smaller cars. These victories have not been added to either driver's NASCAR Grand National total wins and there is a debate whether or not they should be added.

had dictated that if a Grand American car won it would not be credited with the victory; first place points would not be awarded. Despite this, the wins were counted in the constructor's standings and as a start for Lund.

Drivers

The series was dominated by

. Lund won 41 races in the 109 races in the series' history. Lund won three of the four full-season championships, with the other one won by

Ken Rush Kenneth Rush (September 14, 1931 – October 17, 2011) was a NASCAR Cup Series driver whose career spanned from 1957 to 1972.High Point, N.C.

Pete Hamilton Peter Goodwill Hamilton (July 20, 1942 – March 21, 2017) was an American professional stock car racing driver. He competed in NASCAR for six years, where he won four times in his career (including the 1970 Daytona 500), three times driving ...

won 12 of 26 events in 1969.

List of champions

*1968

*1969

Ken Rush Kenneth Rush (September 14, 1931 – October 17, 2011) was a NASCAR Cup Series driver whose career spanned from 1957 to 1972.Dan Gurney Daniel Sexton Gurney (April 13, 1931 – January 14, 2018) was an American racing driver, race car constructor, and team owner who reached racing's highest levels starting in 1958. Gurney won races in the Formula One, Indy Car, NASCAR, Can-Am, ...

Parnelli Jones Rufus Parnell Jones (born August 12, 1933) is an American former professional racing driver and racing team owner. He is notable for his accomplishments while competing in the Indianapolis 500 and the Baja 1000 desert race. In 1962, he became the ...

Mark Donohue Mark Neary Donohue Jr. (March 18, 1937 – August 19, 1975), nicknamed "Captain Nice," and later "Dark Monohue," was an American race car driver and engineer known for his ability to set up his own race car as well as driving it to victories. D ...

and Jim Hall are sometimes credited as "NASCAR Grand American" drivers. The reality is that these road race stars competed in the SCCA Trans-Am series, which had at least one annual event co-sanctioned with NASCAR, the Florida Citrus 250 at Daytona. 1968 championship results: # Tiny Lund: 1,947 points - 9 wins (Mercury Cougar) #

Buck Baker Elzie Wylie Baker Sr. (March 4, 1919 – April 14, 2002), better known as Buck Baker, was an American stock car racer. Born in Richburg, South Carolina, Baker began his NASCAR career in 1949 and won his first race three years later at Columbia ...

: 1,017 points - 3 wins (Chevrolet Camaro) # Jack Ryan: 1,012 points - 0 wins (Porsche 911) #

Jim Vandiver Jim Vandiver (December 13, 1939June 18, 2015) was a NASCAR Winston Cup Series driver who raced from 1968 to 1983. As an independent driver, he had limited financial resources but enjoyed a level of success that relatively few independent drivers ...

: 938 points - 0 wins # Roy Tyner: 881 points - 0 wins # Al Straub: 875 points - 0 wins # Billy Yuma: 710 points - 0 wins # Ernie Shaw: 682 points - 0 wins #

Donnie Allison Donnie Allison (born September 7, 1939) is an American former driver on the NASCAR Grand National/Winston Cup circuit, who won ten times during his racing career, which spanned from 1966 to 1988. He is part of the "Alabama Gang", and is the bro ...

: 664 points - 5 wins # Little Bud Moore: 653 points - 0 wins

Later

The Grand American name was brought back in 1978 when the NASCAR Grand American Stock Car division was defined, as the successor to the series which was previously called "Late Model Sportsman". By 2011 (when that series was named NASCAR Nationwide Series), Chevrolet and Ford had switched to using pony cars in that series (Chevrolet Camaro and Ford Mustang); the Cup Series followed suit in 2018 when Chevrolet replaced their

Chevrolet SS The Holden Commodore (VF) is an executive car that was produced by Holden between June 2013 and October 2017. It was the second and last significantly restyled iteration of the fourth (and final) generation of the Holden Commodore to be manufa ...

with Camaro ZL1 1LE, followed by Ford switching from Ford Fusion to the Mustang GT the following year.

References

External links

Complete race results
{{NASCAR NASCAR series