Editor’s Note: NASCAR is celebrating its 75th anniversary in 2023. SPEED SPORT was founded in 1934 and was already on its way to becoming America’s Motorsports Authority when NASCAR was formed. As a result, we will bring you Part 40 of a 75-part series on the history of NASCAR as told in the pages of National Speed Sport News and SPEED SPORT Magazine.
Dale Earnhardt knew he was part of something special early in the 1987 NASCAR Winston Cup Series season.
“I know we’re a good team and that gives me confidence to go racing,” said Earnhardt in the April 8 issue of National Speed Sport News. “We feel like we can win at every track.”
The Kannapolis, N.C., native’s comments followed his fourth victory of the season in the First Union 400 at North Wilkesboro (N.C.) Speedway and set the tone for his run to a third Winston Cup championship.
The season did not begin as Earnhardt hoped. He qualified a disappointing 13th for the Daytona 500 at Daytona lnt’l Speedway, but worked his way into fifth place behind polesitter and victor Bill Elliott under the checkers. Two weeks later, Earnhardt earned career victory No. 21 at North Carolina Motor Speedway.
After starting back in the pack again (14th), he led 320 of 492 laps en route to the victory.
Earnhardt was now tied with Elliott atop the standings.
Victory No. 2 on the season followed on March 8 at Richmond (Va.) Raceway, despite a car which was damaged during practice.
“Kirk Shelmerdine (crew chief) and Richard Childress (team owner) put their heads together and said they could fix the car,” said Earnhardt. “They carried it to a frame jig and straightened it out. We didn’t know what it would do.”
Earnhardt led more than half of the 400 laps, overcoming a lap-seven spin while attempting to pass race-leader Alan Kulwicki. He also avoided Harry Gant’s spinning Skoal Bandit Monte Carlo on lap 128, but was stung by Gant’s criticism after the race.
“Earnhardt is blind as a bat. He ran all over me,” Gant charged. “I saw him in my rearview mirror, but I saw that he wasn’t below me so I turned down low. I was in the dirt and he also went down there and bam.”
Earnhardt added victories at Darlington (S.C.) Raceway and North Wilkesboro Speedway, but charges of reckless driving continued to haunt him.
“He hit me from behind and spun me,” Sterling Marlin said after the April 2 race at Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway. “That’s just backyard, Saturday-night racing.”
With rain threatening to stop the race, Earnhardt bumped Marlin while he dueled for the lead with Geoff Bodine on lap 252. He failed to grab the point, but after a 90-minute rain delay, worked his way through the pack en route to his fifth victory.
“I got up with Sterling a couple of times, but each time he chopped me off,” Earnhardt explained. “Then we came down into the first turn and the hole closed up and we touched, and then Geoff knocked me into him.
“Bristol is tough,” he added. “You have to race this track aggressively and you’ve got to be on your guard.”
Earnhardt’s fourth consecutive victory and sixth in the first eight races of the season came at Martinsville (Va.) Speedway.
While Earnhardt’ sometimes rough-and-tumble driving style did not make his victories seem easy, the triumphs kept coming. He won the non-point The Winston at Charlotte Motor Speedway, but not without bending some sheet metal.
More Bumper Banging
The Winston held no excitement until the final 10-lap dash when Elliott banged into Geoff Bodine while trying to get a jump on the restart in turn one. Both drivers spun as Earnhardt drove between them to take the lead. Later, Elliott claimed Earnhardt booted him into Bodine.
One lap later, Elliott hit the rear of Earnhardt’s car. He hit it again in turn four, pushing the No. 3 Wrangler car sideways and onto the frontstretch grass, but Earnhardt maintained the lead despite the aid of the No. 9 Coors/Melling car.
He held the inside lane and, as Elliott went high, Earnhardt carried him to the third-tum wall.
Earnhardt overcame Terry Labonte and Tim Richmond-in his first race back after battling pneumonia-for the victory, but the banging was not over. On the cool-down lap, Bodine tapped Earnhardt first, followed by Elliott, who bumped him in turn two and on the backstretch before Earnhardt backed off.
“He hit me several times,” charged a livid Elliott after the race. “If a man has to run over you to beat you, it’s time for this stuff to stop … When a man pulls over and lets you by and then tries to run you into the wall, I’d say that was done deliberately.”
“He hit me once and then knocked me sideways through the grass,” said Earnhardt in the May 20 NSSN. “I got a little upset, which was normal for most anybody, so I carried him high in turn three. But I never touched him, and he knows I never touched him.”
No matter who you believed, NASCAR officials fined Earnhardt, Elliott and Bodine for their actions during the race.
One week later, Earnhardt finished 20th in the Coca-Cola 600 at CMS after losing 85 laps for a cylinder-head repair. Kyle Petty posted his second career Winston Cup victory in the 600.
Earnhardt regained his usual form with a fourth-place finish the following week as Davey Allison won at Dover Downs Int’l Speedway.
It was the rookie-of-the-year contender’s second victory of the season, as he triumphed one month earlier at Talladega (Ala.) Superspeedway despite his father Bobby Allison’s spectacular crash on lap 21. While traveling almost 200 mph, the elder Allison’s car lifted and flew backward and upward into the grandstand fence and began spinning in a horrifying crash.
“It was the lowest period of my life. I looked in the mirror and saw dad’s car was sideways and headed for the grandstand. My heart sank,” Davey Allison stated in the May 6 NSSN. “I forced myself to keep concentrating … When I came back around and saw he was climbing from the car, my heart lifted.”
Bobby Allison escaped without serious injury.
Earnhardt Extends Points Lead
Earnhardt ended a modest losing streak of five consecutive races with a victory at Michigan Int’l Speedway. He grabbed top-10 finishes in the prior two races at Pocono Raceway and Riverside Int’l Raceway, which Richmond won, but held off Davey Allison for the MIS trophy.
Forty-nine-year-old Bobby Allison topped the Firecracker 400 at Daytona, becoming the oldest driver win a Winston Cup Series race. Earnhardt finished sixth. The following week, Earnhardt edged Alan Kulwicki in a paint-swapping duel to win at Pocono.
More top 10s at Talladega, Watkins Glen and Michigan pushed Earnhardt’s point lead to 498 points over Elliott. He stretched it even further after winning at Bristol, while setting the record for most Winston Cup points after 20 races with 3,336.
Victories in the next two races at Darlington and Richmond pushed his point lead to 600.
The championship race was effectively over with seven races remaining. Earnhardt’s first DNF of the season came at Dover, but he followed that with three runner-up finishes and clinched the championship with two races remaining.
“Every time I get in the car it’s like we never won a race before,” said Earnhardt upon securing his third championship. “That’s how fired up the guys on the team are.
“Every one of us on this team started with nothing,” he continued. “Look at Richard Childress. He built race cars at his house. He was a shade-tree mechanic. Now he’s got us in a 30,000-square-foot shop in Welcome (N.C.) that is the envy of everyone in racing.”
Other drivers who were the envy of their rivals in 1987 included Winston Cup’s Most Popular Driver, Bill Elliott, All American division champ Dave Mader Ill and Busch Grand National titlist Larry Pearson.
Modified ace Jimmy Spencer won his division’s title as did NASCAR/ ARTGO Challenge Series driver Dick Trickle. The Winston West top spot went to Chad Little and Larry Caudill won the Charlotte/Daytona Dash Series title. In Busch Grand National North competition, Joey Kourafas was the champion, as was Tobey Butler in the Winston Northwest division.