Nooo... Lee drove the 42 way back in the 50's and very ealry 60's. Richard drove 43 the whole time. When Kyle came along, he drove the 42 for several years.


In that oen race at Riverside, as was stated before, Richard drove the 42, and Kyle drove the 43 for owners points reasons. That was the only race they did that.

 

Thanks Duane for the clarity!

 

Duane, you are my Nascar guru!!!

 

I just reread in the quote... I better make it clear that it was Kyle who drove the 42 for a long time, not Richard. Richard only drove 42 that one time at Riverside in 1981. Kyle drove the 42 for several years before switching to 44, then 45 after Adam died.

 

44 was the Hot Wheels sponsored car, right?

 

That's the one....

 

In honor of the Rolex 24 today, I will post two Classic NASCAR Photos of the Day



The first is classic NASCAR. This is a picture of a set of tires from the first Talladega race. The Good Year guys could not find a compound that would hold up for even nearly as long as the fuel would. If one were to run flat out, they would run about 10-12 laps before the tires looked like this and must be replaced immediately. The fuel could go about 1.5 laps per gallon, or about 28 laps.

It was for this reason that many drivers refused to run the race that day. Richard Petty and all the major names of the day like David Pearson, Buddy Baker, Wendell Scott, Bobby and Donnie Allison, and many others, all packed up their cars and left. The sportsman division cars ended up running the race with Richard Brickhouse in the 99 Nichols Engineering car winning the race.






Second, here is a picture of Dale Earnhardt's Rolex 24 Corvette from a few years back. Corvette and sports car enthusiasts may know it as the year a Corvette outlasted the Daytona prototypes and actually won the overall race, not just division. But NASCAR fans know this was the year that Earnhardt, his son, and two road racing specialists
tackled the 24 Hours of Daytona in a similar Corvette. Their car had a mechanical failure in the night... but Earnhardt was still able to match the lap time set by the race winner.


I had to check the stats, the #2 Corvette actually won the race, and of course, the class, but Earnhard tand his guys were 4th overall and 2nd in class.

 

He was the MAN!
Those tires remind you of anything in recent history? They should have boycotted that race too. Whoever gets it first gets the prize-virtual Goodyear raced tire by Dale Earnhardt!!!

 

A couple of instances come to mind. I believe it was the first year of the COT when they had to start throwing a caution like every 8 laps at Indianapolis?


Or that time they levegated Charlotte and had to start throwing a caution every 25-30 laps?

 

That Indy race was the worst gd abomination of a race that I can recall during my lifetime. They threw competition cautions ever 10-12 laps and there were still drivers not making it between cautions...