But for this first post in THE VIEW FROM THE PITS, I'd like to focus on the man who essentially owned that Most Popular Driver title in the 1980s and 1990s: Bill Elliott. From his first popularity title in 1984 to his last in 2002 – when Junior began his ascension as crowd favorite – Elliott was crowned Most Popular Driver an astounding 16 times.
Elliott crossed my mind recently when, early in September, he failed to start the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race Atlanta Motor Speedway. It was the first time since 1976 – yes, 1976 – that Elliott had missed such a start at what is essentially his home track.
One of my first major motorsports interviews was conducted with Bill in his hauler one Saturday afternoon in 1995, as the drone of the Busch Grand National V6s echoed in the background. Elliott was notoriously soft spoken, even shy, at the peak of his fame. Sometimes all writers could coax out of him was, “Well, we'll just have to wait and see,” or “Well, we’ll just have to see what happens…”
But on this day, Bill was thoughtful and intent on explaining various aspects of his career – including his discomfort with his own racing stardom.
I suppose some people could have considered Bill's honest thoughts to be insulting to the very fans who voted for him as most popular drive year after year. But I guarantee you that even the most outgoing NASCAR personalities have encountered uncomfortable situations that left them wishing they were anywhere else. In my years wandering the NASCAR garage area I've seen what may have been well-meaning fans accosting drivers at the worst possible times. How'd you like to smack the wall at 180 mph, limp the car into the garage, drop the window net and see a Sharpie being presented to you for an autograph?
Here's a look back in time, with Part One of a candid conversation with “Awesome Bill from Dawsonville.” The next post here will conclude the story.
While most NASCAR Winston Cup nicknames are dreamed up in the offices of public relations firms, some titles are built on a solid foundation of legendary racetrack exploits. Greatness in racing has given us The King, The Intimidator -- and Awesome Bill From Dawsonville.
Georgia's Bill Elliott was christened Awesome Bill after displaying an uncanny domination of the very fastest NASCAR superspeedways throughout the mid-1980's. If it was a track like Daytona International Speedway or Talladega Superspeedway -- places where a gas pedal mashed to the floor for lap after lap determined who was the top dog -- often as not Elliott could be found at the front of the freight train, pointing the way through the treacherous draft. To this day, Bill Elliott still holds the record for the fastest lap ever run in a stock car with a 212.809 mph blast around Talladega's towering banking on April 30, 1987. And with NASCAR determined to keep speeds in check, that record may not fall for many moons to come -- if ever.
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| Bill Elliott's Coors-sponsored Melling Thunderbird leads the pack at Pocono in 1990 Winston Cup action. |
Bill Elliott ascended to NASCAR superstardom at the wheel of a racing operation largely directed by members of his family. The team hailed from a small town in Georgia with a melodious name -- Dawsonville. But for the other teams in Winston Cup racing, that melody was often accompanied by a sour tune of defeat.
Elliott Racing first entered Winston Cup competition in 1976. The team was owned by George Elliott, and his sons handled the key responsibilities. Ernie worked on the engines and acted as crew chief, the main mechanical duties belonged to Dan, and youngest son Bill was behind the wheel. And while the team didn't set the racing world on fire right off the bat -- Elliott Racing did not finish six out of the eight races they started that first season -- the family operation had become competitive when an association with oil pump manufacturer Harry Melling began in 1982.
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| Bill Elliott's surge with the Melling team firmly established him as one of NASCAR's top Winston Cup Series drivers. |
The first Winston Cup win of Bill Elliott's career came soon after on November 20, 1983 at the road course in Riverside, California. Melling Racing followed that up with three victories in 13 top-five runs in 1984. But the big season was yet to come.
Bill Elliott was almost unbeatable in 1985, winning an astounding eleven Winston Cup races. Elliott also picked up a new nickname in the process -- Million Dollar Bill. Winston Cup Series sponsor R.J. Reynolds decided it would be a good idea to offer a one million dollar bonus to any driver who could win three of four key NASCAR races at Daytona, Talladega, Charlotte, and Darlington. Bill Elliott thought it would be an even better idea if he went out and won those races.
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| As always, a driver depends on his crew, and the support Elliott received from the Melling team was top notch. |
By driving to victory at the Daytona 500, the Winston 500 Talladega race, and the Southern 500 at Darlington, Bill became the only driver to ever claim the Winston Million. Does Elliott think anyone in today's highly competitive Winston Cup world has a shot at claiming the huge bonus?
"The only guy I know who's been consistent and run well at those places is Dale Earnhardt," Bill Elliott says. "Earnhardt came close to winning it two or three years ago. Rusty Wallace's weak points are speedways like Daytona or Talladega. He's good at Charlotte and he's good at other places, but until he gets his speedway stuff better he's going to have a hard time winning it, too."
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| When the idea of affinity credit cards crept into the world of NASCAR fan marketing, Elliott and Earnhardt were easy choices as the trail blazers. |
The Elliott family's NASCAR success continued in the seasons after 1985, leading up to Bill's capturing of the Winston Cup championship in 1988. But in racing things often happen in cycles, and staying on top for years at a time is just about impossible. The wins became less frequent as the 1990's arrived, and late in 1991 Bill Elliott made an announcement many people thought they would never hear -- Elliott was leaving Melling Racing and the Dawsonville team to join Junior Johnson's two car team in 1992.
"I just wanted to do something different," Elliott now reflects. "I'd driven in that particular situation for my entire career, and it was time for me to just change. I wanted to see how the world revolved on the other side."
As things turned out, it revolved in a very positive fashion. Junior Johnson's teams were the fastest qualifiers for the 1992 Daytona 500, with Sterling Marlin claiming the pole. Elliott started on the outside front row in his red Budweiser Ford Thunderbird, and ran at the front of the pack before a crash involving Ernie Irvan and Marlin knocked Elliott from contention. But that proved to be a minor setback, as the combination of crew chief Tim Brewer and driver Bill Elliott led to four straight wins in the month of March.
"Brewer and I worked real well together," Elliott comments. "I came in and stepped into an entity that was already in place. Junior had some good stuff, and he had a good organization and things came together very well. We put together a heck of a season for the first time we were together, and we accomplished a lot."
The accomplishments nearly included the 1992 championship, but the late Alan Kulwicki captured the title by gaining just ten points more than Elliott. Still, Elliott won the last race of the 1992 season, and with five victories under his belt with the new team Bill had high hopes for 1993. But the expected success never materialized.
After a personal disagreement, Junior Johnson replaced Tim Brewer with Mike Beam as leader of the Budweiser team. While Elliott had worked well with Beam when the two were together at Melling Racing, a crew chief change can upset the temperamental balance of a Winston Cup team. In 1993, the Bill Elliott-Junior Johnson alliance had no wins and just five top-five finishes.
"Junior let Tim go at the end of '92 and brought Mike in," Bill says. "We changed some personnel around on the team and it took us a while to rub the edges off. We had worked together before, but it had been a while. Things had changed so much. I felt we got to running pretty well towards the middle part of the season -- we didn't win a race but we got awful close and ran well and came back well in the points."
Was Junior Johnson around the cars a lot as the team struggled?
"Well, no," answers Elliott. "I'm sure Mike and Tim conferred with him, but he was kind of like an entity that wasn't there all of the time. He would just kind of oversee everything."
As the winless streak grew, Elliott -- consistently voted NASCAR's Most Popular Driver -- began to see some of the uglier sides of race fans.
"I guess I'm going to sound a little cold here," Elliott begins, "but a fan ought to be a person that's with you through thick and thin. If I walk out on a racetrack and a guy walks up to me and he says, 'I'll pull for you if you never win another race' -- that's what makes you feel good. When you walk out there and a guy says, 'if you don't win I ain't gonna pull for you no more' -- fine! You don't need to be pulling for me anyway.
"Everybody wants to be for a winner," Bill continues, "but the way this business goes there's going to be ups and downs, there's going to be cycles, there's going to be people winning and people losing -- but there's always going to be more people losing than there are winning. That's just the way this business is. And I can't control a lot of the circumstances that go on. I'm going to go out there and do the best job that I can, I'm going to try to race people as clean as I can. That's my style, and if people don't like it, fine. I can't help that."
So what do you think? Do you remember when Bill Elliott won the Winston Million, or was that before your time? Were you one of the many who kept Elliott at the top of the most popular driver polls for so many years? Your comments, please...
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