By Rick Sheek (rsheek@starhq.com)
BRISTOL — The Rocket Man is still the fastest man in Bristol Motor Speedway history after that fast lap five years ago.
Ryan Newman, the Dodge driver for Penske Racing, toured the concrete, high-banked, half-mile oval at 128.709 mph in March, 2003. The record stands as qualifying gets underway on Friday for Sunday’s Food City 500.
Newman, who won the season-opening Daytona 500 last month, is winless at BMS in the Sprint Cup Series. He’s fourth in the point standings.
Darrell Waltrip, now in the broadcast booth with Fox, is the all-time BMS winner with 12 checkered flags. That includes the record seven-straight victories which ended at the spring event in ’84.
Junior Johnson, Waltrip’s old boss, the leading owner with 21 wins that included eight consecutive. Chevrolet has 37 victories, to 23 for Ford.
Cale Yarborough has a record five poles. He, Waltrip, Rusty Wallace and the late Dale Earnhardt are tied for second with nine wins each.
Jeff Gordon, the four-time series champion, has five BMS wins — including four straight Food City 500s from 1995-98. Gordon, 35, is the winningest active NASCAR driver (79) and sixth all time.
Points leader Kyle Busch, in his first year with Joe Gibbs Racing and Toyota, is the defending Food City 500. He was in a Chevy with Hendrick Motorsports a year ago in the debut race of the Car of Tomorrow.
Big brother Kurt Busch has owned BMS this decade. After capturing his first Cup win at this event in ’02, he reeled off three straight wins the following two years. He’s won four Food City 500s and is a five-time BMS winner.
The founders of this famed facility were Larry Carrier and Carl Moore. They had traveled to Charlotte Motor Speedway in ’60 for observation, before deciding to build a smaller more intimate version in the Upper East Tennessee mountains.
The inaugural NASCAR race at Bristol Speedway seated 18,000. Fred Lorenzen sat on that first pole in a Ford at 79.225 mph.
Country music star Brenda Lee sang the national anthem. Though only 19 finished, 42 cars started that first Bristol race.
In the fall of ’69, the facility was reshaped the 36-degree high banks installed and the current .533-mile spread was implemented. In ’76, the track was sold to Lanny Hester and Gary Baker. Two years later the name was changed to Bristol International Raceway.
August, ’78, was the first night race, won by Yarborough.
Hester sold his half of the track to Warren Hodgdon in ’82. A year later, Hodgdon completed the 100 percent purchase of the facility and named Carrier the general manager.
In ’85, Hodgdon filed for bankruptcy. Carrier took possession of the property and covered all outstanding debts.
After years of problems with the asphalt surface, Carrier turned heads in ’92 by surfacing the track with concrete. The first NASCAR test after the paving featured Kyle Petty and the late Davey Allison.
In January of ’96, Carrier sold Bristol International Raceway to Bruton Smith for $26 million. At the time of the transaction the seating capacity was 71,000.
The following May the name was changed to Bristol Motor Speedway, and 15,000 seats were added by the August race. A year later, BMS was the largest sports arena in Tennessee (118,000) with 22 new skyboxes.
BMS now holds 160,000, with more than 175 luxury boxes.
In 21 of 40 years since BMS opened, a winner there has gone on to capture the series championship.
Jack Smith won the inaugural BMS event in a Pontiac. The race record is held by Charlie Glotzbach (July, ’71) at 101.074 mph in a Chevy.
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