Seems like yesterday

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — Long before the green flag ever waved for the race at Daytona International Speedway on July 4, 1984, there was an overwhelming sense that Richard Petty would win the event.

President Reagan was in attendance, the first time a sitting president was at a NASCAR race, and Petty was seeking his 200th victory.

Never mind that the seven-time NASCAR champion was in the declining part of his career.

He had worked hard to get the No. 43 STP Pontiac primed for a shot at win No. 200 in Daytona. Everyone in the garage knew how bad he wanted it. All the drivers on the starting grid were aware and most fans in the grandstands knew “The King” was going for it.

So when Reagan gave the command, “Gentlemen, start your engines” from aboard Air Force One, few doubted Petty would find a way his way to Victory Lane.

“I think everybody was talking about his 200th win before the race,” Cale Yarborough said. “But everybody was also thinking about not letting him get it, too.”

Petty almost didn’t, the race coming down to a fender-to-fender duel with the scrappy Yarborough.

The two were racing wheel-to-wheel for the win with three laps left when caution came out. Allowed to race back to the yellow flag in those days, Petty edged Yarborough at the line to earn the milestone victory.

Twenty years later, NASCAR honored the anniversary of Petty’s 200th victory Saturday before the Pepsi 400. Petty took a victory lap in his No. 43 STP Pontiac, then drove into Victory Lane for a celebration.

“It really doesn’t seem like it’s been 20 years,” Petty said. “It was a real special day. You wind up in front of the President of the United States on July 4 and win the race in the final laps. All of it could have been scripted. Nobody would have believed it.”

Had Petty not won that day, he probably never would have gotten his 200th victory. The Daytona victory was the last one of his career, and he spent eight years trying for win No. 201.

But that final victory made Petty the all-time winningest driver in NASCAR’s top series. No one is close to catching the mark. The closest on the list? Retired driver David Pearson with 105 wins.

Petty turned 67 on Friday. He’s been retired for 12 years. He’s still a regular at the race track, his tall, thin figure an overwhelming presence beneath a big ‘ol cowboy hat that hides his black, curly hair.

In a career full of dozens of highs and a fair share of lows — grandson, Adam, was killed in 2000 practicing for a Busch race — Petty doesn’t hesitate when asked what was the highlight.

“That race was the pinnacle of my career,” Petty said. “Winning 200 anywhere would have been great, but doing it under those circumstances and beating Cale, who I’d been racing with for years — it was all in one day, and it was just fantastic.

“It still is. I don’t think there’s anything to match it in the annals of racing.”

Much has changed in the 20 years since that victory.

In the height of Petty’s career, drivers begged for national exposure and clawed and scratched to get enough sponsorship dollars to make every week.

Now, NASCAR is a booming industry. Every race is televised, and drivers are mobbed by fans everywhere they go.

NASCAR has Petty to thank for a large part of its success. He won the Daytona 500 the first time the biggest race of the stock car season was televised live in its entirety, and he won at Daytona again the day the President came to watch.

Reagan lingered after the race to celebrate with Petty and the two had a picnic together in the infield. Those memories are a rich part of NASCAR’s history.

“I look back on my career and the races I won, or could have won, that would have put the 200th at a different time,” Petty said. “If we had won one week before or the month before or the year before, then that would have been the 200th.

“But the president was here, it was July Fourth and that hullabaloo and all that stuff … it was really unreal.”