Gone! With The Wind...

   Through pre-season testing and the miracle of modern computer technology the drivers who will be heading to Florida in a few days for the Daytona 500 know pretty well how their cars are going to perform in NASCAR's biggest race.

   Junior Johnson wasn't privy to such knowledge in 1960.

   In fact, the sport's hardest charger at the time didn't even have a ride.

   No matter that he had won five races in 1959, usually in spectacular fashion for team owner Paul Spaulding.  Surprisingly, Spaulding suddenly decided to quit racing.

   "It looked like I was going to be staying home on the farm and all I was goin' to be ridin' was a tractor," a chuckling Junior recalled recently in a shop he uses nowadays as a base of operations for his varying businesses.  The shop is near Junior's home in his native Brushy Mountains area of North Carolina.

   Then, Junior received a phone call that would lead to the biggest victory of his colorful driving career and also to discovery of a phenomena that forevermore has figured significantly into superspeedway racing.

   The caller was Ray Fox, a highly respected car-builder, crew chief and engineer based in Daytona Beach.

   Fox was building a Chevrolet for the 500 through what amounted to 11th hour sponsorship from John Masoni, owner of the Daytona Beach Kennel Club, the grayhound racing track located just outside the first turn at Daytona International Speedway.  Fox needed a driver, and wanted to know if Junior was interested.

   "It was a spur of the moment deal," Fox told me in an interview for the authorized biography, "Junior Johnson: Brave In Life," from which this article is partially excerpted.  My friend Steve Waid and I co-authored the book.

   "The guy from the dog track came to me only eight days before the Daytona 500 and said very emphatically that he wanted a car in the race," continued Fox.  "I told him there was no way I could do it in that little bit of time.  Masoni left, but returned the next day with a surprising offer.

   "Masoni said to me, 'Whatever you charge to build and field race cars, I'll double it.'  I thought about it and agonized about what to do.  I finally said, 'Well, maybe I can hunt up enough guys to help me get it done.'  I got the guys to my shop, put them to work and phoned Junior."

   "I liked Ray, so I told him I'd come down and see what we could do," said Junior.  "It appeared that Pontiac had the best racecar, and several good drivers were in 'em, including Fireball Roberts and Paul Goldsmith.  I knew it was going to be a challenge."

   As he expected, the Pontiacs were up to 30 mph faster than Junior in practice. And they stayed faster in time trials.

   "I about decided that I was wasting my time," said Junior.  "I was ready to come home.  I didn't want to stay down there in Daytona and watch the Pontiacs lap me about every 10 or 11 laps.  I had no enthusiasm for it."

   "Oh, hell, we were very slow," agreed Fox, looking back.  "We only had a little 348-cubic inch engine.  The Pontiac engine was much better.  I knew that.  I was aware of the situation.  On top of being outpowered, our car was a year old--it was a '59 model.  The only reason I was in the race was because the guy at the dog track making it so worth my time."

   Junior hinted for Fox to get another driver.  However, Fox demurred, vowing to improve his car's speed.  After a series of adjustments, Junior decided to try and run with a top Pontiac in practice.

   "Cotton Owens came by and I got behind him.  Right on his rear bumper," recollected Junior.  "And I stayed there!

   "I came back to the garage and Cotton approached me.  'Boy, you've sure got that thing to running,' he said.  What he didn't know was that I had just discovered the aerodynamic draft at Daytona.  Even Ray thought we were faster due to him somehow fixing the car.

   "I wanted to be sure of what I'd hit on, so I went out to practice alone.  The car was still the same--pretty slow.

   "So I came onto pit road and sat there waitin' for some Pontiacs to come by.  I got in with them on the track.  And I stayed up.  They couldn't shake me.  I knew then I was right about the air creating a situation--a slipstream type of thing--in which a slower car could keep up with a much faster one.  I saw this gave me a chance to win the race."

   Johnson told no one of his discovery, which soon became known as "The Draft."

  Junior started 13th in a 100-mile preliminary event on the sprawling, 2.5-mile Daytona speedway, which had opened in 1959.  He finished fifth behind the Pontiacs of Roberts and Owens and the Fords of Fred Lorenzen and Joe Weatherly.  This result gave Junior the ninth starting position for the second Daytona 500.

   "Once the race started I got to the Pontiacs ahead of me as fast as I could," continued Junior.  "From then on, I did everything the Pontiac drivers did.  If they pitted, I pitted."

   Various problems began taking a toll on the Pontiacs, sending them to the garage.  Eventually, only the Pontiac of Bobby Johns remained competitive, and Junior had track position on him.  However, the lapped Pontiac of Jack Smith gave Johns an aerodynamic tow and he passed Junior for the lead on the 170th lap of the race's 200.

   "Then, coming off the second turn with 10 laps to go, one of the damndest things happened I ever saw on a track," said Junior.  "The back glass popped out of Bobby's car and flew into the air.  I think our speed and the traffic circumstances combined to create a vacuum that sucked that back glass right out.  The sudden change in the airflow around Bobby's car caused him to spin into the grass along the backstretch.  By the time he got straightened out and back on the asphalt I was long gone."

   Junior swept to the checkered flag 23 seconds ahead of Johns, who recovered to finish as the runnerup.

   The father-son duo of Lee and Richard Petty placed third and fourth, respectively in their Plymouths, and were the only other drivers to complete all 200 laps.

   The immensely popular victory was the biggest of a career that produced 50 triumphs.

   "I look back and it still amazes me that we won," said Junior.  "The Chevy motor was sorry for racing at that time.  The valves would come out and it wouldn't turn a lot of RPM.  We had to run it at 7,500 RPMs that whole race just to keep up, so it's a wonder the motor lasted.

   "On top of this, the 500 that year was filled with wrecks, and I was very, very close to several of them.  I remember one guy wrecked along the backstretch in front of me and the engine came out of his car.  I went into the grass and almost into the lake in the infield to miss that mess.  I was within two or three feet of being involved in other big wrecks."

   The crashes exacted such a toll on the 68-car field that NASCAR was forced to cancel the next two races.  Most observers traced the trouble to drivers being unaccustomed to the then scorching speeds of around 150 mph on the high-banked track.

   "I guess that's probably the reason a lot of 'em wrecked, but the speed wasn't a problem to me," said Junior.  "See, the cars during my liquor-hauling days were light and they had big engines that had been bored and stroked and carried three or even four carburetors.  Some of the engines had superchargers.

   "So in driving a race car at Daytona it wasn't like I was getting into something I wasn't used to.  I had run cars faster than that racin' the law on the highway."

   Junior smiled and shook his head.

  "I had run 'em so fast on the highway that sometimes the road ahead looked only a foot wide."