1967 Atlanta 500

1967 Atlanta 500
Race details[1]
Race 10 of 49 in the 1967 NASCAR Grand National Series season

Layout of Atlanta International Speedway, used until 1996
Date April 2, 1967 (1967-April-02)
Official name Atlanta 500
Location Atlanta International Raceway, Hampton, Georgia
Course Permanent racing facility
1.500 mi (2.400 km)
Distance 334 laps, 501.0 mi (804 km)
Weather Warm with temperatures approaching 80.1 °F (26.7 °C); wind speeds up to 8 miles per hour (13 km/h)
Average speed 131.238 miles per hour (211.207 km/h)
Attendance 70,000[2]
Pole position
Driver
Wood Brothers
Most laps led
Driver Cale Yarborough Wood Brothers
Laps 301
Winner
No. 21 Cale Yarborough Wood Brothers
Television in the United States
Network untelevised
Announcers none

The 1967 Atlanta 500 was a NASCAR Grand National Series (now Sprint Cup Series) event that was held on April 2, 1967 at Atlanta Motor Speedway in Hampton, Georgia.[2]

The race car drivers still had to commute to the races using the same stock cars that competed in a typical weekend's race through a policy of homologation (and under their own power). This policy was in effect until roughly 1975. By 1980, NASCAR had completely stopped tracking the year model of all the vehicles and most teams did not take stock cars to the track under their own power anymore.

Background

Atlanta International Raceway (now Atlanta Motor Speedway) is one of ten current intermediate track to hold NASCAR races; the others are Charlotte Motor Speedway, Chicagoland Speedway, Darlington Raceway, Homestead Miami Speedway, Kansas Speedway, Kentucky Speedway, Las Vegas Motor Speedway, New Hampshire Motor Speedway, and Texas Motor Speedway.[3] However, at the time, only Charlotte and Darlington were built.

The layout at Atlanta International Speedway at the time was a four-turn traditional oval track that is 1.54 miles (2.48 km) long.[4] The track's turns are banked at twenty-four degrees, while the front stretch, the location of the finish line, and the back stretch are banked at five.[4]

Summary

There were 44 American-born drivers on the grid; Cale Yarborough managed to defeat Dick Hutcherson by just more than one lap in front of 70000 live audience members.[2][5] The race lasted nearly four hours with the average speed being 131.288 miles per hour (211.288 km/h).[2][5] Yarborough's qualifying speed was 148.996 miles per hour (239.786 km/h); bringing his speed close to the 150 miles per hour (240 km/h) threshold.[2][5] Veteran NASCAR owner Nord Krauskopf would employ drivers Charlie Glotzbach and Bobby Isaac during the race.[2] Blackie Watt would finish in last-place on lap 2 due to a difficulty in the engine department.[2][5] Meanwhile, windshield problems would knock Don White out of the race at lap 193 of 334.[2][5] Six cautions were handed out by NASCAR officials for a distance of 39 laps.[2][5]

Fred Lorenzen would race for the final time in his legendary #28 white and blue 1967 Ford Fairlane machine that would make him popular in NASCAR. Curtis Turner, who was driving a Chevrolet owned by Smokey Yunick, would escape being injured in a practice session that managed to become a wild crash session.[6]

The entire racing purse for this racing event was $64,995 ($461,256.93 when adjusted for inflation); the winner's share of this amount was $21,035 ($149,281.32 when adjusted for inflation) while the last-place winner received a meager $540 ($3,832.28 when adjusted for inflation).[5]

Top thirty finishers

Timeline

References

  1. ↑ Weather information for the 1967 Atlanta 500 at The Old Farmers' Almanac
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 1967 Atlanta 500 at Racing Reference
  3. ↑ "NASCAR Race Tracks". NASCAR. Retrieved September 2, 2011.
  4. 1 2 "NASCAR Tracks—The Atlanta Motor Speedway". Atlanta Motor Speedway. Archived from the original on 21 July 2011. Retrieved September 2, 2011.
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 1967 Atlanta 500 racing information at Fantasy Racing Cheat Sheet
  6. ↑ Wild practice session - 1967 Atlanta 500 at HowStuffWorks.com
Preceded by
1967 untitled race at Bowman-Gray Stadium		 NASCAR Grand National Series Season
1967 		Succeeded by
1967 Columbia 200
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