The thing about the Elliotts is that in 1984 they had won some races, but NOBODY was ready for what they would do in '85. If it happened today...well it couldn't. NASCAR wouldn't let it happen. This was real racing.
Beautiful racing! Beautiful cars! Beautiful speed! Awesome drivers! Look at the stands. PACKED!! It's not like this anymore. Because NASCAR is boring now. Chase/playoff thing is stupid too. They need to go back to the classic rules and racing. I miss those old NASCAR days. Damnit!
I only know NASCAR from about 1997 forward. I am from up north and never would have watched this stuff as an 10 year old in Feb of 85. Watching this is amazing. These old school videos show just what a different, more exciting version of the sport it was back then. It was undoubtedly more dangerous though. It is pretty clear that no sport has changed more in the last 25 years than NASCAR.
Notice how much smaller those TBirds were?? Cut through the air much better, plus Ernie Elliott was a genius with Ford cylinder heads. Winning combination
Jesus that #9 was so dominant. I read that those T-Birds in the 80s were made so aerodynamically well, thats partly why they were so fast. I wonder what the average speed was
@cjs3872 Build the fences higher and stronger and let them race! In fact, that was Bill Elliott"s exact quote about the restrictor plate when it was first used.
Agree 110%, NASCAR says they implemented restrictor plates due to Bobby Allison's crash at Talladega.....wrong....it was cause of that #9. I don't care what anybody says.
I agree, this was real racing back then for sure. It even seemed like the announcers got more excited. All you hear them say today is "Johnson's leading followed by Dale Jr & Danica Patrick in 30th & 31st respectively"
This was from back in the days when the guy who showed up with the fastest car, could win. Back in the days before NASCAR took "racing" out of "racing".
For years, it was almost impossible the get tickets to this race. I used to go to the July race, and ISC would send me ticket ordering literature for all the coming events at their racetracks. The only tickets available at Daytona in February was the Twin 125’s and the Busch race. Now you can get tickets the day of the Daytona 500.
@Mike Hegarty I agree. But not about the 1 1/2 mile tracks. Those are some of the best races. I hate the roval at Charlotte. Atlanta, Las Vegas, Texas, Charlotte, Kansas, Kentucky, Chicagoland. Theres only 7 of them, and they are all very different
"Rubberband racing" is what a lot of us refer to it as, at Indianapolis these days; and it's everywhere, in an era where everyone apparently thinks "competition" means "not allowed to be too good". Meanwhile, it's cathartic watching Elliott's car just blow away anything they allow them to run these days.
@cjs3872 we can agree to disagree then. I sat in the stands at Daytona last year and was bored out of my mind until the last 2 restarts. Not my idea of better. I would rather see the old days of 3 - 5 cars finishing on the lead lap than having the traffic jams that have resulted in the restrictor plate / lucky dog / wave around era.
This was the year NASCAR and GM realized that their old, tired 1954 designed SBC really was not going to cut it against a canted valve Cleveland Ford and began a "PLEASE help us" campaign. Fortunate for them they successfully framed it so that the Frances understood that the sport would not want to see 8 Thunderbirds run off and hide every Sunday. From there on out it was OK to bring special GM heads to the track while Ford stuff was deemed "too hot" and outlawed. I think the Wood Brothers even decided to run a Windsor because of the BS. Eventually it even worked into GM body mods for the Monte and the Lumina...just total BS. Then we get the GM SB2 and it just did not make sense to watch any longer. I think a lot of us felt the same way. To bad. It was once really good.
And NASCAR held him for 41 seconds to tape up a headlight door that fell off, goes all the way back to third, then 5 laps later took the lead again said bye-bye everybody. Bill was on the gas and hauling ass.
@cjs3872 There are alot of ways to protect the fans without restricting the cars. First, they can build the fences as high as they want, second, move the seats further back away from the racing surface and go higher in the top rows. With all of the technology racing has developed since the 80's (when racing was racing), I can't believe the only way they come up with safety for the fans is by dumbing down the cars!
You never see chevys running away from the field like that, The started tightening up on restrictions to stop that. Now they are all even in a wad. Let em run what they brung!
Restrictor plates were mandated supposedly for safety after Allisons crash. Yet more cars have gone into the catch fence because of the tight packs created by the restrictor plate. So make no mistake Ernie Elliot, Robert Yates and Ford are the reason for the WWE crashfest you see today. The restrictor plate leveled the playing field for Nascars GM buddies. That number 3 behind you may have been "intimidating" but that number 9 in front of you.took your self esteem.
GM squellled and squalled cried and whinned about the Ford's being too fast and Nascar dummed the Ford's down so the Chevy's could catch up! And ever since the late 80's Nascar has went down hill to the boring cookie cutter crap they call racing today! I've not been to or even watched a race in the last 15 years and I live less than 5 miles from Talladega Superspeedway!
@cjs3872 Anything can happen at anytime, at any track. In 1979 at a 1/2 mile in CT (Stafford) a modified launched into the fourth turn grandstands, and took out some people. I was there that night and in fact that modified was going about 73 mph, not 190. My point is not to let the cars go as fast as possible, it's to restrict them in other ways (smaller engines ect) so they may not be going as fast, but you would still have good racing.
Waddell Wilson started at Holman Moody (as did Robert Yates) so he knew the big block Fords well - had not worked as much on the Clevor engine Ernie had perfected for 1985......rule changes on heads allowed and the slant back GMs put the advantage back toward GM. Eventually Yates designed the head that kicked GM rear all of 1992......which resulted in the SB2 being allowed to again allow GM to keep up
Yea but NASCAR fixed that BS. No more hill billy's gonna come in here with a Ford of all dang things and embarres our favorite GM automobiles by gosh.Messes up the natural order of things . DONT IT CHIVY BOYS???
@cjs3872 Friend I don't need the history lesson. What is your solution to the boring racing that has been at the plate tracks in the recent past? If people don't feel safe sitting in the stands then either stay home or go to the go-cart track!
If nascar wants to bring back the good times, they should remove the restrictor plate and make the teams run treaded 305s. Gotta put on the brakes baby! Ain't taking the corner flat out.
Far more money has been lost on "big one" demolition derby crashes than on engines blowing. And if they wanted to lower speeds, they could reduce engine size. No, restrictor plates exist for only ONE reason, to bunch fields up into dangerous high-speed Tetris games, the likes of which helped kill Dale Earnhardt and Dan Wheldon (open-wheel aerodynamics with Wheldon instead of plates, but still the same philosophical principle of compulsory 'super-packs'). NASCAR doesn't care about economics, it cares about being as artificially crafted as WWE, only on asphalt.
I would be too expensive to have teams build completely different engines for just two tracks. The plate was a simple and cheep way of slowing the cars, they never expected it to create large packs. Plus, I dont think you can say that these plates caused the accidents that killed Dale and Dan, Dales accident was simply a freak thing that was the result of many bad things happening at one, could of happened at any track. Dans accident is completely unrelated, is just an effect of close competition that hadn't existed in the past, causing cars to be much more bunched up than even 3-4 years earlier.
"... they never expected it to create large packs ..." Incorrect. They had used restrictor plates before in the early 1970s, and they had caused large packs to form then as well. Historical evidence indicated exactly what was going to happen, and that was precisely why they did it, to create artificial closeness between the cars that would otherwise begin to widely separate between the strongest and the weakest. Meanwhile, I'm not claiming that Dale and Dan COULDN'T have died in racing accidents if the restrictor plates/wings hadn't been there, but that they magnified the results of the accidents due to the closeness that they by-definition impose. Point blank, if that super-pack hadn't been there, that crash at Las Vegas would not have happened as it did, period. One car, maybe two or three at most, would've spun/crashed, rather than the mass-multi-car chain reaction that actually happened. Mass roving packs are more dangerous than when the cars separate, by the laws of physics. Disagreement is simply blank denial.
The thing about the Elliotts is that in 1984 they had won some races, but NOBODY was ready for what they would do in '85. If it happened today...well it couldn't. NASCAR wouldn't let it happen.
This was real racing.
Ya nascar loves chevys & Toyota!!!
Beautiful racing! Beautiful cars! Beautiful speed! Awesome drivers! Look at the stands. PACKED!! It's not like this anymore. Because NASCAR is boring now. Chase/playoff thing is stupid too. They need to go back to the classic rules and racing. I miss those old NASCAR days. Damnit!
When NASCAR racing, especially at Daytona without restrictor plates, was fun to watch.
I remember at Talladega Darrell waltrip said that Bill's car sucked the guts out his motor. Lmao.
That, my friends, is how you do it. Let your performance be the 'intimidating' factor.
I only know NASCAR from about 1997 forward. I am from up north and never would have watched this stuff as an 10 year old in Feb of 85. Watching this is amazing. These old school videos show just what a different, more exciting version of the sport it was back then. It was undoubtedly more dangerous though.
It is pretty clear that no sport has changed more in the last 25 years than NASCAR.
Yes it has changed. But not for the better!!!!!!
I was 1 Day Old This day. Birthday was February 16. Huge NASCAR FAN TO THIS DAY!!! I turned 35 today.
Notice how much smaller those TBirds were?? Cut through the air much better, plus Ernie Elliott was a genius with Ford cylinder heads. Winning combination
In those days you could tell a good engine tuner by the the size of the pile of junk cylinder heads out behind the shop.
Jesus that #9 was so dominant. I read that those T-Birds in the 80s were made so aerodynamically well, thats partly why they were so fast. I wonder what the average speed was
The 500 mile average for the 1985 Daytona 500 was 172 +. In 1987, the average was 177.8
@cjs3872 Build the fences higher and stronger and let them race! In fact, that was Bill Elliott"s exact quote about the restrictor plate when it was first used.
I remember back in the 70's, they had no speed limit on Pit Row. Neil Bonnet would come flying in full speed. It was exciting.
Agree 110%, NASCAR says they implemented restrictor plates due to Bobby Allison's crash at Talladega.....wrong....it was cause of that #9. I don't care what anybody says.
Amen! Ford and that #9, is the real reason NASCAR restrictor plates! Them government motors engines, popped left and right, trying to keep up!
Totally
@Hello shane murphy, How are you doing?
i was there for this race it was awesome!!
I agree, this was real racing back then for sure. It even seemed like the announcers got more excited. All you hear them say today is "Johnson's leading followed by Dale Jr & Danica Patrick in 30th & 31st respectively"
Wished racing would go back to that.
how bout those fords!! man that t-bird was fast...
Bill Elliott's 5th of 44 Career NASCAR Winston Cup wins
This was from back in the days when the guy who showed up with the fastest car, could win. Back in the days before NASCAR took "racing" out of "racing".
The stands were PACKED!!
Nowadays not so much. Went downhill when Toyota came in and Pontiac left.
More the corporate interest, "teams" and the COT.
For years, it was almost impossible the get tickets to this race. I used to go to the July race, and ISC would send me ticket ordering literature for all the coming events at their racetracks. The only tickets available at Daytona in February was the Twin 125’s and the Busch race. Now you can get tickets the day of the Daytona 500.
@Mike Hegarty I agree. But not about the 1 1/2 mile tracks. Those are some of the best races. I hate the roval at Charlotte. Atlanta, Las Vegas, Texas, Charlotte, Kansas, Kentucky, Chicagoland. Theres only 7 of them, and they are all very different
Oh my god, they're LIFTING at Daytona! Crazy!
PUUUUUURREE SPEEED!!!!!!
Even with a restart with 4 to go..as at 5:36 they say "No one's been able to contain Elliott ALLLL afternoon!"
this was real racing... fords. #9 ruled. miss this racing..
so fast the others gave up on down force from the spoilers and flew into the restrictor plated future
Elliot had some power back then DAMMMMMMMMMM
"Rubberband racing" is what a lot of us refer to it as, at Indianapolis these days; and it's everywhere, in an era where everyone apparently thinks "competition" means "not allowed to be too good". Meanwhile, it's cathartic watching Elliott's car just blow away anything they allow them to run these days.
Might have been my first time at Dayton remember the race didn't last long and the speed was something else
"Hey! No fair! We're slow!" Says everyone in a GM race car......
One car owners. Cars that sounded great. When the driver could make the difference between winning and losing. When nascar was worth watching.
Won by 37 seconds in twin 125 .that's impressive
@cjs3872 we can agree to disagree then. I sat in the stands at Daytona last year and was bored out of my mind until the last 2 restarts. Not my idea of better. I would rather see the old days of 3 - 5 cars finishing on the lead lap than having the traffic jams that have resulted in the restrictor plate / lucky dog / wave around era.
This was the year NASCAR and GM realized that their old, tired 1954 designed SBC really was not going to cut it against a canted valve Cleveland Ford and began a "PLEASE help us" campaign. Fortunate for them they successfully framed it so that the Frances understood that the sport would not want to see 8 Thunderbirds run off and hide every Sunday. From there on out it was OK to bring special GM heads to the track while Ford stuff was deemed "too hot" and outlawed. I think the Wood Brothers even decided to run a Windsor because of the BS. Eventually it even worked into GM body mods for the Monte and the Lumina...just total BS. Then we get the GM SB2 and it just did not make sense to watch any longer. I think a lot of us felt the same way. To bad. It was once really good.
One of those cars would lap the field in 20 laps today
GM motors popping left and right......because they could not keep up with one Ford
Yarborough blew as well in a Ford. In 1985, I tend to think there were three major engine makes out there: Ford, Chevy and Ernie Elliott's creation.
thwe only thing good about this race was the fact thast bill elliot won,and more importantly,in a FORD!awesome bill,you were the MAN!
And NASCAR held him for 41 seconds to tape up a headlight door that fell off, goes all the way back to third, then 5 laps later took the lead again said bye-bye everybody. Bill was on the gas and hauling ass.
Oh, BTW, a lap at Daytona in 1985 was 44.79 seconds
@cjs3872 There are alot of ways to protect the fans without restricting the cars. First, they can build the fences as high as they want, second, move the seats further back away from the racing surface and go higher in the top rows. With all of the technology racing has developed since the 80's (when racing was racing), I can't believe the only way they come up with safety for the fans is by dumbing down the cars!
I miss NASCAR, use to never miss a race on tv, haven’t watched in 3 years, too boring, now it’s a product, not racing, too bad
You never see chevys running away from the field like that, The started tightening up on restrictions to stop that. Now they are all even in a wad. Let em run what they brung!
@Hello roderray , How are you doing?
Awesomebill from Dawsonville ❤❤
go get them bill u the man
@Hello ben merrin, How are you doing?
what exactly did Ernie do to those engines?
Everything he could
Good year to be a Ford fan.
Restrictor plates were mandated supposedly for safety after Allisons crash. Yet more cars have gone into the catch fence because of the tight packs created by the restrictor plate. So make no mistake Ernie Elliot, Robert Yates and Ford are the reason for the WWE crashfest you see today. The restrictor plate leveled the playing field for Nascars GM buddies. That number 3 behind you may have been "intimidating" but that number 9 in front of you.took your self esteem.
GM squellled and squalled cried and whinned about the Ford's being too fast and Nascar dummed the Ford's down so the Chevy's could catch up! And ever since the late 80's Nascar has went down hill to the boring cookie cutter crap they call racing today! I've not been to or even watched a race in the last 15 years and I live less than 5 miles from Talladega Superspeedway!
cale was one hell of a driver.
NASCAR, the last time, before it was Chevrolet's biggest sponsor..
Dear screaming NASCAR on NBC, this is how you call a race people
@cjs3872 Anything can happen at anytime, at any track. In 1979 at a 1/2 mile in CT (Stafford) a modified launched into the fourth turn grandstands, and took out some people. I was there that night and in fact that modified was going about 73 mph, not 190. My point is not to let the cars go as fast as possible, it's to restrict them in other ways (smaller engines ect) so they may not be going as fast, but you would still have good racing.
I'm with you on the smaller engine size maybe limit size to three hundred cubic inch.
that car was a bullet on 4 wheels
Awsome bill. Enuff said
Waddell Wilson started at Holman Moody (as did Robert Yates) so he knew the big block Fords well - had not worked as much on the Clevor engine Ernie had perfected for 1985......rule changes on heads allowed and the slant back GMs put the advantage back toward GM. Eventually Yates designed the head that kicked GM rear all of 1992......which resulted in the SB2 being allowed to again allow GM to keep up
LAKE SPEED WAS SECOND TO THE AWESOME BILL FROM DAWSONVILLE.
Can you upload the entire race?
It's on here in its entirety
Yea but NASCAR fixed that BS. No more hill billy's gonna come in here with a Ford of all dang things and embarres our favorite GM automobiles by gosh.Messes up the natural order of things . DONT IT CHIVY BOYS???
@cjs3872 Friend I don't need the history lesson. What is your solution to the boring racing that has been at the plate tracks in the recent past? If people don't feel safe sitting in the stands then either stay home or go to the go-cart track!
If nascar wants to bring back the good times, they should remove the restrictor plate and make the teams run treaded 305s. Gotta put on the brakes baby! Ain't taking the corner flat out.
Bill Elliott had German build engines
Far more money has been lost on "big one" demolition derby crashes than on engines blowing. And if they wanted to lower speeds, they could reduce engine size. No, restrictor plates exist for only ONE reason, to bunch fields up into dangerous high-speed Tetris games, the likes of which helped kill Dale Earnhardt and Dan Wheldon (open-wheel aerodynamics with Wheldon instead of plates, but still the same philosophical principle of compulsory 'super-packs').
NASCAR doesn't care about economics, it cares about being as artificially crafted as WWE, only on asphalt.
I would be too expensive to have teams build completely different engines for just two tracks. The plate was a simple and cheep way of slowing the cars, they never expected it to create large packs. Plus, I dont think you can say that these plates caused the accidents that killed Dale and Dan, Dales accident was simply a freak thing that was the result of many bad things happening at one, could of happened at any track. Dans accident is completely unrelated, is just an effect of close competition that hadn't existed in the past, causing cars to be much more bunched up than even 3-4 years earlier.
"... they never expected it to create large packs ..." Incorrect. They had used restrictor plates before in the early 1970s, and they had caused large packs to form then as well. Historical evidence indicated exactly what was going to happen, and that was precisely why they did it, to create artificial closeness between the cars that would otherwise begin to widely separate between the strongest and the weakest.
Meanwhile, I'm not claiming that Dale and Dan COULDN'T have died in racing accidents if the restrictor plates/wings hadn't been there, but that they magnified the results of the accidents due to the closeness that they by-definition impose. Point blank, if that super-pack hadn't been there, that crash at Las Vegas would not have happened as it did, period. One car, maybe two or three at most, would've spun/crashed, rather than the mass-multi-car chain reaction that actually happened.
Mass roving packs are more dangerous than when the cars separate, by the laws of physics. Disagreement is simply blank denial.
Gone... those days are gone.. cookie cutter cars today.
Cookie cutter drivers too!