40 Years Later, Classic To Carnage

   Maybe it was the fault of the full moon, bathing Lowe's Motor Speedway in light and working some kind of a menacing, mysterious mojo.

   This would be a convenient--although eerie--explanation of what went wrong Saturday night in NASCAR's UAW-GM Quality 500 at the track near Charlotte.

   Lunar lunacy, of course, had nothing to do with this calamity, which would have been almost comical if the danger level hadn't been elevated to Code Red for the drivers, who were blowing out tires and crashing with frightening regularity.

   The problem was man-made, a combination of a too-smooth racing surface that produced speeds too high on the 1.5-mile track for the tires to handle.

   An event record 13 cautions slowed the show, forcing the yellow flag to fly almost as frequently as it does in the sprint-caution-sprint-caution wreckathons at Bristol Motor Speedway in Tennessee.

   Watching the 500 on TV at home Saturday night, I couldn't help but contrast the farce in sheet metal carnage to the classic National 400 of Oct. 17, 1965 at the track then known as Charlotte Motor Speedway.  Four decades later, it remains the best autumn race ever at the track, and one of the most thrilling anywhere.

   How awesome it would have been Saturday night if the thousands of fans at Lowe's Motor Speedway and the millions watching NBC's telecast could have seen something like that.

   Look back with me...

   

   Over the final 90 laps in '65 legendary drivers Fred Lorenzen, A.J. Foyt, Curtis Turner and Dick Hutcherson dueled door-to-door.  They often ran three abreast.  The racing probably would have been four-wide if there had been another lane.

   There were 11 lead changes in those 90 laps.  During a sizzling 25-lap stretch as the finish drew near Lorenzen and Foyt swapped first place seven times.

   "It was incredible racing.  All the crew guys and team members on pit road were standing on the wall watching in excitement and near-disbelief at what we were seeing," recalls Waddell Wilson, who built the engine in the Ford that Lorenzen was driving for the fabled Holman-Moody operation.  "The mouths of even the most jaded guys were hanging open."

   With six laps remaining, Hutcherson, Lorenzen and Foyt ran side-by-side going into turn three.  Hutch was on the inside, Lorenzen in the middle and Foyt on the outside.  Suddenly, Foyt's car bobbled and got atop the steel railing.

   Foyt still contends that a tap from Lorenzen sent him out of control.  Lorenzen says that Foyt got into marbles on the high side of the banking.

   With two laps to go Hutcherson decided to take a shot at Lorenzen, a Holman-Moody teammate.  Hutcherson couldn't get around.  Wilson's engine and Lorenzen's driving skill simply were too strong a combination.

   Lorenzen took the checkered flag three car lengths ahead of Hutcherson, with Turner right behind.  Foyt finished sixth, two laps down.

   Many in the crowd, estimated at 50,000, were limp from the drama and remained at their seats long afterward, savoring what they had just seen and cheering the drivers.  It was that great.

   However, the excitement was tempered when word came that a crash on the second lap had taken the life of driver Harold Kite, who was making his first start at NASCAR's top level in nine years.  Kite, 43, spun out in turn three and suffered massive injuries when his car was hit by that of Jimmy Helms.

   Back in the summer I ran into Dick Hutcherson at--of all places--a kids' baseball game.  It was a "small world" situation.  Unbeknownst to us, his great-nephew Austin Hutcherson and my grandson Jeffrey McCarter turned out to be 10-year-old teammates in a Mooresville (N.C.) Recreation Department league.

   Between innings, Hutch and I reminisced about that fabulous fall race 40 years ago.

   "What's your most vivid recollection of it?" I asked the gentlemanly Hutcherson.

   He smiled softly.

   "I remember," he said, "how very deeply I wished that I had won."