More to ol' D.W. than 'Boogity, Boogity, Boogity'
Im sure everyone would expect me to write about Jeff Gordon coming from three laps down to win at Martinsville Sunday but guess what? Im not. I canÆt become too predictable. I got to keep you guys on your toes.
Watching "Trackside" this weekend made me think about Darrell Waltrips career. He won 11 times at Martinsville, which means he has 11 of the grandfather clocks that the winner is given. This weekend he was presented with a 12th clock to commemorate all his success at the track.
Unfortunately, I dont remember all his successes. And a lot of new or younger NASCAR fans probably dont either.
I didn't start following NASCAR until the early 1990s, right about the time that D.W.Æs career started its downslide.
When I was younger I had no idea how amazing a driver he was back in the day. To steal a phrase from Kurt Busch, I thought he was just a decrepit old never-was.
Oh, how foolish I was in my youth.
The more I started to learn about NASCAR and read about the history of the sport, the more I discovered about what an amazing driver D.W. was.
There are only three guys who have won more than three championships. Waltrip is on the list of those with three.
While his 84 career Cup victories are dwarfed by Richard Pettys ridiculous 200 wins û only 60 were in the modern era -- they're enough to put him third on the all-time list. HeÆs also third on the list of starts with 809.
Want a few other of D.W.'s amazing stats? NASCAR.com offers up these:
ò 59 poles is fourth best in Cup history
ò In 1981 he set the modern-era record for wins from the pole with eight
ò 5 Coca-Cola 600 victories
ò First driver to win more than $6 million in prize money
ò 1989 Daytona 500 champ
Not bad, eh? (IÆm sorry. When did I become Canadian?)
NASCAR has grown in popularity exponentially in the 1990s and unfortunately that means that a lot of fans, myself included, never got to see Waltrip in his heydays.
His three championships came in 1981, 1982 and 1985 û back when I was just a little tyke.
The last six seasons of his career Waltrip finished no better than 19th in the standings and in his final season in 2000 he finished a dismal 37th.
I guess it wasn't really my fault for thinking he was just an old man looking to catch a break. I had no idea that he finished in the top 10 from 1975 to 1989 and that in only three of those years did he finish outside the top five.
It now bothers me to think there are millions of fans out there who may only know "Good ol' D.W." as the "Boogity, boogity, boogity, letÆs go racing, boys" man who makes up word likes co-opetition.
Theyre truly missing out.
HeÆs so much more than that. HeÆs nothing short of a legend.