A truly sad day in NASCAR

As the sun was setting on another year, it was also setting on the one of the longest running sports dynasties. Yesterday, New Year's Eve 2008, Petty Racing Enterprises completed it's final lap. The organization founded by Lee Petty in 1949 was absorbed by Gillette-Everenham Motorsports. Lack of sponsorship and the resources necessary to compete effectively in the sport in which its name had become synonymous led to the sale to GEM. In 2009, for the first time in 6 decades, the name Petty will not be active in any NASCAR competition. It is truly a sad time for NASCAR.

Lee's son Richard rose to the top eventually becoming known as "The King" of NASCAR. Richard Petty won 7 Cup Championships, a feat that has only been matched once, by Dale Earnhardt who won his 7th championship in 1994. Richard Petty won an incredible 27 of 48 races in 1967 including 10 in a row. Another record that will most likely remain untouched. In a five year span that ended in 1971 Petty and his famous #43 car visited victory lane an unprecedented 81 times. In its storied history, Petty Enterprises racked up a total of 268 wins, 890 top 5's, 1269 top 10's, led 61,574 laps, and won 9 Daytona 500's.



Most of the 268 victories can be credited to Lee and Richard Petty, but there were other drivers who contributed who were not family members. In 1970 a relatively unknown New England driver named Pete Hamilton won the Daytona 500 driving Petty's #40 car. Hamilton won three of the 18 races that someone other than a Petty won for the team. Richard Petty retired in 1992. The last victory for Petty Enterprises came in 1999 and John Andretti was the driver.


Kyle Petty, Richard's son became the third generation of Pettys debuting at Talladega in 1979. Kyle's son Adam made it four generations when he made his debut at Texas in 2000. He finished 40th in that race. Tragedy hit the family and the race team hard though that same year. Three day's after Adam's first race, his great-grandfather Lee Petty died of complications following surgery. One month after that, Adam was killed in a crash during practice for a Busch Series race at New Hampshire. The Pettys both as a family and as a race team never really recovered after that.

Now, just 8 years later, the end has come to the organization whose name has become synonomous with NASCAR. In 2008 Petty Enterprises sold the majority of the race team's interest to the private equity firm Boston Ventures. Also in 2008, General Mills, long-time sponsor of Petty's flagship #43 car announced they were taking their sponsorship to Richard Childress Racing in 2009 leaving the Petty Dodge unsponsored. At the end of the season Petty Enterprises began laying off people and Kyle Petty announced that he was no longer with the organization that proudly bore his family name for 60 years. Not long after that, former champion Bobby Labonte, driver of the #43 for 3 seasons, was released from his contract and talks began to incorporate the famous #43 in to Gillette Everenham Motorsports.

As a NASCAR fan since childhood and a fan of the Pettys for just as long, I am saddened by this turn of events. NASCAR has become more of a business now than a competitive sport. The true sportsmen and competitors who are under capitalized are being squeezed out by big money business types who care more about dollar signs than checkered flags. I will continue to watch the sport I love and follow my favorite driver (Bobby Labonte). Only, I will do so with a knowing that the sport will never be the same without the Pettys' name and influence. NASCAR isn't really NASCAR without the Pettys.

Jim Chitty
Writer/Columnist/Blogger/NASCAR Fan