Editor’s Note: As SPEED SPORT enters its 90th anniversary year of covering motorsports, Hendrick Motorsports is celebrating its 40th anniversary. We dig into the archives and look back at Hedrick’s first NASCAR Cup Series victory on April 29, 1984. Here’s the story as it appeared in the May 2, 1984 issue of National Speed Sport News.
MARTINSVILLE, Va. — The half-mile Martinsville Speedway is only a little wider than a cow path leading through a pasture from a barn to a nearby creek. And the speedway is flatter.
To pass a car in the outside groove here is like walking a scaffold around
the top floor of the Empire State Building. You hold your breath a lot, don’t look to the right, and do a lot of leaning to the left.
In either case, you realize one slip to the right means watching the world go by. Off the scaffold means the end. Out of the groove means going to the rear of the slowest train in Winston Cup racing.
But Geoff Bodine did it Sunday afternoon — and he did it the hard way, coming from fourth to first in the final 54 laps. He did it by passing Bobby Allison, Darrell Waltrip and Ron Bouchard, getting around all three in the outside lane.
Bodine’s bid came after race leader Ricky Rudd had engine problems and dropped by the wayside. The race for the lead during the final 50 laps turned an otherwise lackadaisical afternoon into a few moments of excitement, despite the fact Bodine drove away and left the other three once he took the lead.
Bouchard finished second, 4.61 seconds behind. Waltrip, who now leads the Winston Cup standings by 84 points, was third. Allison was fourth and in the same lap. Rounding out the top five, but a lap down, was Neil Bonnett.
It was Bodine’s first career victory in NASCAR Grand National racing, but his 10th win at Martinsville Speedway. Seven of the wins have been while driving a modified, and two of the victories came in late model sportsman events. His last checkered flag here was at the end of a 1981 race for modifieds.
Bodine joined All Star Racing at the beginning of this season. It was a new team being formed by Rick Hendrick with veteran crew chief Harry Hyde helping form it. Sunday’s victory in the 500-lap, 250-mile event, however, was not a record for a new team winning on the Winston Cup trail. This was the eighth race for Bodine, Hyde and Hendrick. The Cliff Stewart team, new at the time, won the spring race here at Martinsville in 1981, with Morgan Shepherd driving. It was the seventh race for the Stewart team, which did not start the year until after the races at Riverside and Daytona.
“I don’t believe even Harry and I thought we would win this soon,” Bodine said. “We both told Rick it would take a while, but he has put a bunch into this team. For example, we have four cars ready to race and we’re preparing a fifth one.”
For Hyde, 59, this was his 43rd career victory. His last win came in 1977 at Ontario, California. He was then crew chief for a team owned by Jim Stacy. Neil Bonnett was the driver.
Bodine, who drove for Stewart’s team last year, said Hyde was the only reason he came to the new team. “When Harry asked me, I was ready,” Bodine said.
“The reason I asked Geoff was because there wasn’t anyone else available,” Hyde said, joking and smiling.
“That’s not what you told me at the time,” Bodine fired back.
Hyde said the reason Bodine ran so well was because prior to the race, “Geoff’s wife lost their parking pass. He was so mad he could bite nails. By the time the race started, he was ready to take on the world.”
Bodine said before the race started that Hyde told him not to worry about bending the fenders. “He said to just keep the wheels rolling. Really, I felt Ricky (Rudd) had the strongest car for a long time, but after the last pit stop I believe we had the fastest car of the day.”
Bodine said he was especially pleased to win his first race at Martinsville.
“There were so many special people here today who have helped me along during my career,” he said. “I couldn’t begin to name them all. But, for example, I would like to thank people like Cliff Stewart and his wife, Tommie, who gave me a chance in my first Grand National car.”
Bodine averaged 73.264 mph around the little track, and won $29,880. There were 11 caution flags for 53 laps, and 14 lead changes among six drivers. Allison led 266 laps of the race, Rudd 121, Bodine 55, Joe Ruttman 45, Waltrip one and Terry Labonte one.
Bodine took the lead for good on lap 452.
The 10th caution — the next-to-final one — came while Rudd was leading. It was to remove from the track the exhaust pipe which fell off his car on the backstretch. The final yellow waved after Rudd’s car stalled on the track.
“The exhaust fell off as a result of that wreck with (Dave) Marcis. When the pipe came off, it got hot in the car and under the hood. We must have burned up the ignition or something. I thought we had Bodine covered, but by lap 390, the engine started missing and I knew then that the race was gone. There was no excuse for that wreck between Marcis and myself. NASCAR should have black flagged Marcis. He was two laps down and shouldn’t have been racing with the leaders like that,” Rudd said.
“I didn’t start that stuff with Ricky,” Marcis said. “He hit me. I don’t know why he did it. I had been running a nice, steady pace and hadn’t hit anyone. Then we came·off the second turn and started down the backstretch, and Ricky ran all over me. I wasn’t blocking anybody. I was running down on the curb and trying to get my lap back.”
Bouchard was happy with second, but said he wished the last caution. had not come.
“We had a broken motor mount, but that didn’t hurt too much. I just wish we’d never had that last caution. Both Geoff and I came in for fresh tires, but all we had left were two new tires. That was the difference. His tires were better than mine.”
Waltrip said he simply got outrun “by about five of them out there. I think we are going to have to do a little research and development. We’re going to have to get back on track a little. The car just didn’t run like I wanted it to. It didn’t run or handle well all day.”
Allison said he ran out of brakes. “The brakes went out before the halfway point of the race, but I was still able to go pretty hard. It was a great disappointment because the car was so strong,” Allison said.
Waltrip and Terry Labonte were tied in the point standings coming into the race. Labonte was involved in a wreck and finished 24th. He now trails Waltrip by 84 points and is 12 points ahead of Dale Earnhardt, now third in the standings. Allison, the defending champion, is in 11th place, 348 points behind Waltrip.
“When Tim Richmond and Dick Brooks spun in turn four, Rudd and Bodine went high,” Labonte said. He was a lap behind at the time, but running on the bumper of the leaders. “I thought I could go low and get inside. There was a hole there just big enough for my car, but when I got there, I found it wasn’t so big. Richmond came down the track and closed the hole.”