The Win-One Cup

Chasing a Winston Cup driving championship isn’t quite what it was 30 years ago. On the other hand, there are some parallels. Ask Benny Parsons.

The lovable teddy bear from Ellerbe, N.C., won the championship in 1973, even though he’d won only one race.

“It wasn’t that big a deal, winning the championship, back then,” Parsons recalled in a phone call from his home. “I think David [Pearson] won 11 races and I only won one.

“My reaction was mostly, ‘Whew, it’s over.’ It was more a sense of relief than joy.”

NASCAR didn’t think it was such a big deal, either. The awards banquet was held at the Plaza Hotel in Daytona Beach, Fla., where Parsons shared the stage with two other series champions, Jack Ingram, late models, and Richie Evans, modifieds. A few years later, the awards dinner was moved to the Waldorf-Astoria in New York City.

The disparity between Parsons’ one victory and Pearson’s 11 prompted Big Bill France, NASCAR’s founder-czar, to call for an overhaul of the points system. The problem was the result of cherry picking by Pearson and several other leading drivers, who entered only selected big-money races, skipping most of the others. With R.J. Reynolds putting up big chunks for money for the championship, France wanted to assure that top drivers would be at all events, so he commissioned Bob Latford to devise a points scheme that would do the job.

Latford’s proposal, which was adopted in 1975, is still in effect. However, although it virtually guarantees that all leading drivers will be in every race, it has not solved the problem of a driver’s winning the championship with far fewer victories than someone else.

No one since Parsons has won the title with only one win, but Matt Kenseth is leading the 2003 race by such a wide margin that most observers are already calling him the next champion -- and he has won only one race, as have the next four drivers in the standings. Ryan Newman, who has won five, is 616 points behind in eighth place. Kenseth could sit out three races and even if Newman won them all, he would still be 61 points behind Kenseth.

“You can see the changes they made in the points didn’t change much,” Parsons said. “It was the money and all the attention NASCAR got from RJR and Winston that made the difference. There was so much money to be won that all the guys wanted in on it.”

What occurred in the pits during the American 500 at Rockingham, N.C., where Parsons needed to hold off Richard Petty and Cale Yarborough in the year’s final race to win the crown, was more gratifying to him than any hardware he received.

“We crashed on the 13th lap when I got hit by a car coming out of the second turn and it knocked the entire right side off the car, including the roll cage. We had brought extra equipment, things like rear ends, springs, bell housing, but obviously no roll bars. The car was still on the wrecker when someone noticed a car sitting in the garage that had failed to qualify, so we went and took the roll cage out of that car and put it in ours. It took a hour and 15 minutes before we got back on the track.”

It also took the combined efforts of a number of mechanics from other teams. Some tore off loose sheet metal, others jacked up the car and shouted for parts. Travis Carter, Parsons’ 23-year-old crew chief, estimated it would have taken two men two 20-hour days to get the car ready to race again.

When Parsons’ No. 72 Chevy came rolling back on the track, the crowd of 34,000 stood and cheered. Thanks to attrition, Parsons finished 28th in the 4-hour 14-minute race, high enough to remain ahead of Yarborough, who was third. The camshaft broke on Petty’s Plymouth and he was credited with 35th. Pearson won in a Mercury.

“There wasn’t much drama, as I remember it,” Parsons said. “I think we parked it, once we got to where we knew we had the championship in hand. It was just a relief to get it over.”

After 28 races, Parsons had 7,173 points to 7,106 for Yarborough and 6,877 for Petty, who fell to fifth.

Curiously, Parsons scored his only victory with help from a relief driver, John Utsman.

“I had a pinched nerve in my neck and Bristol [Tenn.] is about the toughest track physically we ran, so I took John with me. I drove about 300 laps and he drove the other 200. It’s a half-mile oval with 30-degree banking and you’re only on the straightaways for about 2 1/2 seconds. Most of the time, you’re fighting to keep from sliding out the door.

“It was in July, and it was blistering, and it was only four days after the Firecracker 400 at Daytona. I could never have done it all myself.”

The Parsons-Utsman duo won by seven laps.

“Winning the Winston Cup is big now, but when I won the Daytona 500 in 1975, it was a much bigger deal than the championship,” Parsons said.

The 500 win gave Parsons’ legion of friends in the garage area another opportunity to show their respect for the big guy.

When Parsons crossed the finish line and drove down pit road to the winner’s circle, crews of rival teams stood on the pit wall and applauded. Dale Inman, Petty’s crew chief, stood out in the middle of the track, giving thumbs up to Parsons.

“The championship takes so long, 10 months or so, that it becomes a grind,” Parsons said. “A race like Daytona was over in a little more than three hours and when you take the checkered flag it’s like instant gratification. It’s something that, when things aren’t going well, I can stop and think, ‘I won Daytona.’ That’s something that will never go away.”

After retiring as a driver in 1988, Parsons became a broadcaster and now shares the NBC booth with Allen Bestwick and Wally Dallenbach at Winston Cup races.

Watching today’s drivers, and having raced against those in another era, Parsons says it is impossible to compare Petty, Pearson and Bobby Allison with Jeff Gordon, the Earnhardts or Bill Elliott.

“A great driver today would have been good in the ‘60s and ‘70s, and a great driver then would be good today,” he said. “The reason you can’t compare them is because the cars are so different. There is just no comparison in equipment. But a great driver could drive anything.”

Even Benny Parsons, who started out driving taxicabs in Detroit before racing with the good ol’ boys of NASCAR.

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One for the Road

The top five drivers in the 2003 Winston Cup standings have won one race this season. The last time a driver won the series with one win was Benny Parsons in 1973. A look at this season and the series winners the last 10 seasons:

2003 STANDINGS

A look at the Winston Cup standings and the number of races won by the series leaders:

*--* DRIVER POINTS WON 1 Matt Kenseth 3,432 1 2 Dale Earnhardt Jr 3,103 1 3 Jeff Gordon 2,971 1 4 Kevin Harvick 2,953 1 5 Michael Waltrip 2,923 1 6 Jimmie Johnson 2,908 3 7 Bobby Labonte 2,825 1 8 Ryan Newman 2,816 5 9 Kurt Busch 2,810 3 10 Robby Gordon 2,777 2

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REMAINING SCHEDULE

*--* 13 races remain in the Winston Cup: Sunday Sharpie 500 Aug. 30 Mount. Dew Southern 500 Sept. 6 Chevy Rock & Roll 400 Sept. 14 Sylvania 300 Sept. 21 Dover 400 Sept. 28 EA SPORTS 500 Oct. 5 Banquet 400 Oct. 11 UAW-GM Quality 500 Oct. 19 Subway 500 Oct. 26 Georgia 500 Nov. 2 Checker Auto Parts 500 Nov. 9 Pop Secret 400 Nov. 16 Ford 400

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HISTORICAL

The driver who has finished the season as the Winston Cup points champion didn’t always win the most races. A look at the last 10 years:

*--* YEAR WINNER W POINTS RACES W POINTS 1993 Dale Earnhardt 6 4,526 Rusty Wallace 10 4,446 (2nd) 1994 Dale Earnhardt 4 4,694 Rusty Wallace 8 4,207 (3rd) 1995 Jeff Gordon 10 4,614 Jeff Gordon 10 4,614 (1st) 1996 Terry Labonte 2 4,657 Jeff Gordon 10 4,620 (2nd) 1997 Jeff Gordon 10 4,710 Jeff Gordon 10 4,710 (1st) 1998 Jeff Gordon 13 5,328 Jeff Gordon 13 5,328 (1st) 1999 Dale Jarrett 4 5,262 Jeff Gordon 7 4,570 (6th) 2000 Bobby Labonte 4 5,130 Tony Stewart 7 4,570 (6th) 2001 Jeff Gordon 6 5,112 Jeff Gordon 6 5,112 (1st) 2002 Tony Stewart 3 4,800 Matt Kenseth 5 4,432 (8th)

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