#51 - Ontario ~ The Best Laid Plans
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06/14/2017 Matt McLaughlin |
(Editor’s Note) In 1997
- 1998, Matt McLaughlin penned a special Anthology of historical pieces in
honor of the 50th Anniversary of NASCAR entitled "50 Years of NASCAR
Racing." Matt has entrusted the entire collection, minus one or two that
were misfiled back then and cannot be salvaged, to my tender, loving care.
As NASCAR turns 70, the
Anthology itself will celebrate a 20th anniversary through 2018, and will run
again here on Race Fans Forever. As before, there is no record of which pieces
came first, so it will appear in the sequence presented earlier. Please, sit
back and enjoy as you take a journey back through the pages of history and
perhaps relive a memory or two.
As always, many thanks
to Matt, and God bless you my friend. ~PattyKay
The developers of the beautiful Ontario Motor Speedway
must have wondered why no one had beat them to the idea. It seemed such a
perfect idea that someone should build a new superspeedway to cater to auto
racing fans in the densely populated and car crazy environs of Los Angeles,
where near perfect weather was almost guaranteed. And they did not just build a
race track; they built a virtual palace of speed, the widest, fan friendliest
race track ever conceived, the Granddaddy of tracks like Texas and Las Vegas
today. The track was even patterned after the Indianapolis Motor Speedway,
which had been making money for all those decades. It seemed a sure bet and all
they would have to do was wait for the money to start rolling in after making
their shrewd investment.
The inaugural Miller 500 at Ontario was unique for a
lot of reasons. For one thing it was the 1000th race ever run in NASCAR's top
division. These days that fact alone would be reason enough to celebrate with truckloads
of die casts and T shirts, and a black tie ceremony. That day it went all but
unnoticed. It was also the richest race ever run in NASCAR history to that
point, with posted awards of $207,650 dollars. The start was also unique in the
Winston Cup era, with the cars lining up three wide just as the open wheel cars
did at Indianapolis. Despite all the hoopla, while the crowd was decent, 78,810
fans, the massive speedway was only about 60% filled to capacity. At least part
of the problem had to do with bad timing that was beyond anything the Ontario
developers could have foreseen. 1971 was a difficult transition year between
the era of the factory involvement in NASCAR and the Winston Cup era. Ford had
quit the sport all together and Chrysler was backing only two cars out of the
Petty stables. Some drivers couldn't find rides and some teams were talking
about quitting rather than going broke racing. Holman and Moody had decided
despite the big purse and their driver's great record on big tracks, it was not
worth the money and effort to build a new car for fan favorite David Pearson to
drive at Ontario.
Those fans on hand were treated to a memorable race.
Indy car star AJ Foyt was entered, driving for the Wood Brothers, and he
dominated the race. But the newly un-retired Fred Lorenzen gave him a run for
his money and led three times before engine failure and a resultant fire
sidelined him. That left it to Petty Enterprise teammates, the King and Buddy
Baker, to uphold the NASCAR regulars honors and they made a show if it. Petty
uncharacteristically made a mistake, skidding right past his pit stall, and the
time he lost backing in cost him his shot at the trophy. Buddy Baker took the
point briefly but spun himself out. He was closing on AJ again when he ran out
of laps and Foyt took the win by a tick over eight seconds.
The size of the crowd was down to 68,500 in 1972
despite near perfect weather. While a lot of drivers had switched rides, the
man to beat remained the same. AJ Foyt was once again a favorite in the Wood
Brothers' Mercury, fresh off an impressive victory with the same team at the
Daytona 500. While Foyt's car was undeniably fast, he
had more problems working traffic than the NASCAR regulars. There was a
frightening wreck early in the going when Bobby Isaac and Mark Donohue got
together. Isaac emerged from his car, staggered a few feet and collapsed.
Fortunately, his injuries were mainly bruises and having the breath knocked out
of him. There were 51 lead changes amongst 7 drivers, though Foyt led the most
laps handily. He finally managed to get a handle on traffic, bypass Baker for
the lead, and hold off a determined last ditch charge by Bobby Allison to win
the race.
There was no Ontario race in 1973 owing to a business
shake up, but the track was given the prestigious season-ending event of the
1974 schedule. The race was held over a month after the second to last event in
Rockingham. Richard Petty was comfortably in command of the points hunt for that
season by the time the race was held, which cut down on the hoped for drama.
Perhaps that explains why the attendance was down to a dismal 43,250 folks. The
purse was also down dramatically with a mere $15,125 to that year's winner, as
opposed to almost $52,000 to Foyt for his win in the inaugural event. Once
again AJ Foyt was a favorite and he led much of the race, right into the final
stages. Finally Bobby Allison was able to power by him in an ungainly AMC
Matador and take the lead for good with thirty laps to go. Late in the event,
AJ had an engine go sour and had to coast to the finish, winding up fifth.
David Pearson inherited the runner up honors. After the race, an inspection
found a roller cam, which was blatantly illegal, in the AMC engine of Allison's
car. The win was very much in doubt. Finally NASCAR decided to let the win
stand, though they fined Allison $9,100 of that paltry $15,000 check. Richard
Petty blew an engine late in the going, but still won the Winston Cup
championship.
Attendance rebounded slightly for the 1975 race, which
was again the season finale. Once again Richard Petty had a comfortable points
lead over number two man, Dave Marcis. The event did
have a surprise winner in that, that driver was surprised to be there. Buddy
Baker was driving for Bud Moore, who had decided not to race at Ontario. Baker
left on a fishing vacation and afterwards Moore signed Norris Industries as a
sponsor. The new sponsor wanted the car to run at Ontario, so a panicked phone
call was made to Baker, who cut short his vacation and headed to California as
his car was hastily prepared and shipped. Baker went on to win the race, and as
expected, Petty won the championship. That race could have been called the Soda
Pop 500, because "So-da-mn many engines popped.
Of the 40 starters, 21 were listed as being out of the race with engine related
problems, including Petty, Parsons, and Foyt,
The finish of the 1976 race at Ontario was not a
particularly good one. There were only three leaders that day, Richard Petty,
Cale Yarborough, and David Pearson, who took the point on lap 80 and never
relinquished it. The results were not all that surprising in that it was the
tenth big track win Pearson racked up in 1976, in only 22 starts. Once again
the Winston Cup championship was all but a foregone conclusion by the time the
tour reached Ontario. Despite losing a clutch and finishing 23rd, Cale
Yarborough won the title handily over Richard Petty.
Cale Yarborough had clinched his second consecutive
Cup title at Rockingham, two races before the tour reached Ontario in 1977.
Despite that, the '77 event was arguably the best race ever held at Ontario.
The normal group of drivers that fans expected to run up front, Petty, Allison,
Yarborough, Pearson and Waltrip all took their turns at the front, but there
were some surprises. Janet Guthrie became the first female driver to lead a
race in NASCAR's top rank, leading under caution from lap 43 to 47. More
importantly, Neil Bonnett, who had only one win on his career, and that on a short
track, was also among the contenders that afternoon, in a Dodge owned by JD
Stacy. Bonnett took the lead from David Pearson on lap 172, but Petty was hot
on his tail. Petty actually managed to get around Bonnett on lap 195, but Neil
retook the advantage the next lap and thwarted every trick in the King's not
inconsiderable repertoire to reach the checkers two car lengths ahead of the
King. Besides the win asserting Bonnett as a legitimate contender, the win is
also important in retrospect in that it was the last win in NASCAR's top league
for a Chrysler product, despite the way Dodge Chargers had dominated the series
during the 70's.
The 1978 Los Angeles 500 at Ontario was a shootout
between the two drivers who had battled all year for the points
title, Cale Yarborough and Bobby Allison. The battle was for bragging rights
only, as once again Cale had clinched his title two races before at Rockingham,
scoring his record third Winston Cup Championship in a row. Cale almost missed
the event when his car cut out on the warm up laps before the race, but Cecil
Gordon pushed Cale back to the attention of Junior Johnson's crew in the pits,
and hasty repairs were made to the ignition system. Richard Petty, who was
winless for the first time in his career, thrilled his many fans by leading
early, but the bad luck that had plagued him all year struck again as the King
lost an engine. Late in the event, Yarborough and Allison (who won 15 of 30
events that year between them) fought it out, with Allison taking the lead on
lap 187 and fighting to keep Cale out of his draft before Yarborough could
perform his patented last lap slingshot trick. Allison prevailed by two car
lengths, winning the battle, though he had already lost the war.
1979 was the first time that the season finale at
Ontario was to decide the Winston Cup championship. Darrell Waltrip entered the
event with a mere two point edge, so it was probable whichever driver finished
ahead of the other would be crowned champion. That part of the drama was
settled early, with Waltrip looping his car and going a lap down. Richard Petty
was a true racer and rather than employing a conservative strategy to clinch
the title like some drivers have since, (no names here) Petty diced for the win
with four other drivers, Bobby, Cale, Buddy and Benny, throughout the event.
While he was courting disaster with the strategy, that's why Richard remains
the King. In the end, Petty finished 5th, while Benny Parsons grabbed the lead
from Bobby Allison with five laps to go and held on to beat the leader of the
Alabama Gang by .42 seconds. Richard Petty received his seventh and final
championship, just one year after having been shut out of the win column. And
perhaps it's fitting a young man from Kannapolis, North Carolina, Dale Earnhardt,
was crowned Winston Cup Rookie of the Year. Most likely because of the tight points battle, the track attracted 56,000-plus spectators
that day, still dismal, but better than it had been for years.
The points title was on the
line once again when the Cup regulars came calling on Ontario for the season
finale in 1980, though that year it was not as close. It was Earnhardt's title
to lose, and Cale would have needed some bad luck on Dale's part to take his
fourth championship in his final ride with Junior Johnson's team. Perhaps it's
understandable that Dale's Rod Osterlund-owned team
experienced jitters as first-time title contenders, as did their driver. Keep
in mind, the team’s crew chief, Doug Richert, was all
of 20 years old and had been thrust into the spotlight when Suitcase Jake Elder
quit the team without warning after the World 600 in May. Earnhardt pitted
before the pits were opened early in the event and was penalized a lap. At the
same time, Cale Yarborough was doing what he needed to do, dicing it out for
the lead with Darrell Waltrip, who was his heir apparent in Junior's car for
the next season. Earnhardt gamely struggled back, and a well-timed caution flag
put him back on the lead lap. But the foul luck and jitters were still going to
make things interesting. There was a miscommunication between the crew and Dale
on the final pit stop with just 17 laps to go. Earnhardt thought it was a gas
and go stop, while the crew thought they were going to do right side tires.
Dale roared out of the pits with just two lug nuts holding on the right rear
tire, and was promptly black flagged. Speedy work by the pit crew managed to
keep Dale from losing a lap, but he was out of the hunt for the win and Cale
was still right up front. With Cale's habit of passing
for the win on the last lap, a lot of fingers were crossed. Bobby Allison had a
nice lead going when he blew a tire and gave the point to Benny Parsons. That
moved Cale up another spot, but Allison beat Earnhardt coming out of the pits,
returning to the action in fourth, with Yarborough third and Dale fifth. Cale
advanced no more positions, and Benny beat Neil Bonnett handily. Dale Earnhardt
won the title by a mere 19 points. Despite all the excitement, the race was a
disaster for the track's owners, with less than 15,000 paying fans in the
stands that day, about 1/8 the number who had shown up to see the Daytona 500
earlier that year. Faced with financial ruin, they threw in the towel and the
track was sold to Chevron oil. The magnificent speedway was leveled in favor of
a refinery, and thus ended the sad history of the Ontario Motor Speedway.
Racing continued in Southern California at the
Riverside road course until that track failed as well, and fell into the hands
of real estate developers who built a subdivision there. While NASCAR continued
visiting California, it was up North in Sonoma, outside of San Francisco.
Racing did not return to Southern California until 1997, with the opening of
Roger Penske's new track, which is similar in spirit to the old Ontario
Speedway. Let us hope in the end it does not share the same sad fate.
*Matt can no longer
field comments or email at Race Fans Forever. If you have comments or
questions, please leave them below and I’ll do my best to supply answers.
~PattyKay Lilley, Senior Editor.
