Richard Petty is a racing legend, winning a record 200 races during his career and winning the Daytona 500 a record seven times. Besides Dale Earnhardt, he is the only other driver to win the NASCAR Championship seven times, and is the record he is most known for.
Born in 1937, Richard Petty ran 1184 NASCAR Sprint Cup races over 35 years. While he has won 200 races, he has 712 top ten finishes in his career. Richard Petty is considered the greatest NASCAR driver of all time with 513 consecutive starts from 1971 to 1989.
Racing comes naturally to Richard Petty - his father Lee Petty won the very fist Daytona 500 race in 1959 (Lee Petty is also a three time NASCAR Championship winner). It seems to run in the family; his son Kyle is a NASCAR star in his own right. Tragically, his grandson Adam passed away in an accident at the New Hampshire International Speedway, right after he had lost his famous father.
The Petty family owns and operates Petty Enterprises, his family's racing team. Based out of an enormous 100,000+ square foot former Yates Racing facility, he is still active in the organization and is as always popular with the fans and is to this day commonly asked to sign autographs.
He got his start in racing at the age of 21 and was 1959's NASCAR Rookie of the Year with a record of 9 top 10 finishes (6 of these were top 5 finishes!). He continued to be one of the sport's top racers right up to his 1992 retirement; his last top 10 finish was in the 1991 Budweiser at the Glen race.
Richard Petty is remembered for three of the many crashes he survived. In 1970, at the Rebel 400, he was injured when his Plymouth Road Runner cut a tire and slammed into a wall, flipped several times, injured his shoulder and bounced his head off the pavement several times. This accident caused NASCAR to require the safety netting over the driver's window.
Petty somehow managed to keep a broken neck a secret from the world, even competing in a few more races after being injured in a race at Pocono in 1980. His other incredible crash came in 1988 in the Daytona 500, when he was in a crash which sent pieces of his car flying - Petty himself though was able to walk away unhurt save for some temporary visual impairment.
Richard Petty was inducted into the International Motorsports Hall of Fame in 1997. He was named one of NASCAR's 50 greatest drivers in 1998 and was awarded the Medal of Freedom by George H W Bush in 1992, the first sports figure to receive the honor.
Petty was always close to his fans, staying hours after races had concluded to sign autographs. He has also appeared in several films portraying himself. These films include Speed Zone, Stroker Ace and Swing Vote.
With a racing heritage handed down from his father that won the first Daytona 500, and passed down to his racing son, Kyle, Richard Petty's life has revolved around the racing world and continues to this day.
Born in 1937, Richard Petty ran 1184 NASCAR Sprint Cup races over 35 years. While he has won 200 races, he has 712 top ten finishes in his career. Richard Petty is considered the greatest NASCAR driver of all time with 513 consecutive starts from 1971 to 1989.
Racing comes naturally to Richard Petty - his father Lee Petty won the very fist Daytona 500 race in 1959 (Lee Petty is also a three time NASCAR Championship winner). It seems to run in the family; his son Kyle is a NASCAR star in his own right. Tragically, his grandson Adam passed away in an accident at the New Hampshire International Speedway, right after he had lost his famous father.
The Petty family owns and operates Petty Enterprises, his family's racing team. Based out of an enormous 100,000+ square foot former Yates Racing facility, he is still active in the organization and is as always popular with the fans and is to this day commonly asked to sign autographs.
He got his start in racing at the age of 21 and was 1959's NASCAR Rookie of the Year with a record of 9 top 10 finishes (6 of these were top 5 finishes!). He continued to be one of the sport's top racers right up to his 1992 retirement; his last top 10 finish was in the 1991 Budweiser at the Glen race.
Richard Petty is remembered for three of the many crashes he survived. In 1970, at the Rebel 400, he was injured when his Plymouth Road Runner cut a tire and slammed into a wall, flipped several times, injured his shoulder and bounced his head off the pavement several times. This accident caused NASCAR to require the safety netting over the driver's window.
Petty somehow managed to keep a broken neck a secret from the world, even competing in a few more races after being injured in a race at Pocono in 1980. His other incredible crash came in 1988 in the Daytona 500, when he was in a crash which sent pieces of his car flying - Petty himself though was able to walk away unhurt save for some temporary visual impairment.
Richard Petty was inducted into the International Motorsports Hall of Fame in 1997. He was named one of NASCAR's 50 greatest drivers in 1998 and was awarded the Medal of Freedom by George H W Bush in 1992, the first sports figure to receive the honor.
Petty was always close to his fans, staying hours after races had concluded to sign autographs. He has also appeared in several films portraying himself. These films include Speed Zone, Stroker Ace and Swing Vote.
With a racing heritage handed down from his father that won the first Daytona 500, and passed down to his racing son, Kyle, Richard Petty's life has revolved around the racing world and continues to this day.
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