Richard Petty celebrated his 80th birthday in the company of fellow NASCAR titans, friends, and family while accepting the Robert E. Petersen Lifetime Achievement Award.
Richard Petty, better known as “The King” to his generations of followers, celebrated his 80th birthday in the company of fellow NASCAR titans, friends, and family. Jeff Gordon, Kyle Petty, Rusty Wallace, Bobby Allison, Donnie Allison, and NASCAR vice chairman Mike Helton were also present at Los Angeles’ iconic red-and-chrome Petersen Automotive Museum to see Richard accept the Robert E. Petersen Lifetime Achievement Award.
With 7 NASCAR championships, 200 race wins (7 of which came from the Daytona 500), and countless on-track achievements, it’s no surprise how The King got his crown – but Richard’s throne isn’t built on checkered flags, unmatched career records, and winner’s circle photos alone. “For me to stand up here, 99-point-9 percent of you people out here made Richard Petty,” he said to the crowd. Y’all was behind me, whether you know it or not. You were able to push me, I tell ya, to the front. And to you all, thank you for doing it.”
The Robert E. Petersen Lifetime Achievement Award has celebrated Dan Gurney, Art Chrisman, Carroll Shelby, George Barris, Andy Granatelli, The Ford Family, Vic Edelbrock, Jack Roush, Ed “Isky” Iskenderian, “Speedy” Bill Smith, Alex Xydias, Wally Parks, and Ed Pink in the past.
“I’m just getting old. But, Petersen has been in publishing of all kinds of racing magazines. Being they cover all types of racing, to be selected in something like this is really a big thing. I guess it winds up showing we had a lot of good people working for us to be able to put us in this position,” The King said. “It wasn’t a one-man show. What can you do by yourself? I’ve accomplished nothing by myself. With the crowd around me we’ve accomplished a lot. I just happen to be the guy out front. I’m not pulling them, they are pushing me.”
The evening flowed with the class of the man himself, though the acres of aluminum, steel, and carbon-fiber interspersed throughout the crowd didn’t hurt either.
It goes without saying that Richard is earning of an achievement that shares our founder’s namesake. Never leaving his hometown of Level Cross, North Carolina, he’s not only won over 16-dozen races, but several of them are keystones of NASCAR history: his dramatic win during the first-ever flag-to-flag live-airing of the Daytona in 500 in 1979 (then-leader Donnie Allison and second-place Cale Yarborough crashed on the last lap, leaving Richard to fend off Darrel Waltrip for the checkered flag); not only was he the first driver to win the Daytona 500 twice, but in his record-breaking third win in 1971 came the year after the infamous Wing Cars were banned; after Petty formed the Professional Driver’s Association, a driver’s union, negotiations turned violent when LeeRoy Yarbrough punched NASCAR founder Bill France in the mug – Petty, LeeRoy, and some three-dozen other drivers boycotted the 1969 Talladega race over safety concerns; his 200th victory – a clincher between him and Yarborough at the 1984 Firecracker 400 – was witnessed and celebrated with then-President Ronald Reagan (earning his title, The King); his last race, an unfortunate crash-out at the 1992 Hooters 500, was also Jeff Gordon’s rookie race; and while his Oldsmobile suffered a mechanical failure eight laps into the inaugural Dayona 500, Richard hopped into the pits for his father’s Olds Super 88.
Lee Petty was no. 42, Richard became no. 43, his son, Kyle Petty, continued as no. 44, and the late-Adam Petty lives on as no. 45. Richard has taken the seed his father planted in NASCAR’s earliest days and cultivated it into the one of the sport’s most iconic racing families – all with a smile from under the shadow of that big Charlie Horse 1 cowboy hat.
Richard continues his work at the Petty Family Foundation, which supports veterans, children, and communities while also campaigning Aric Almirola’s NASCAR Cup Car (at the Mooresville, NC-based Richard Petty Motorsports) and churning high-powered customer builds from the same plot of land where his dad began building stock cars more than half-a-century ago.
The post Video: Celebrating Richard Petty’s 80th Birthday appeared first on Hot Rod Network.