SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
One of NASCAR's most popular and winningest drivers has died. Hall of Famer Bobby Allison was 86 years old. Allison's stock racing career spanned more than three decades and included a championship. Andrew Yeager from WBHM in Birmingham, Alabama, has this remembrance.
ANDREW YEAGER, BYLINE: For Bobby Allison, it started with his grandfather. He lived with Allison's family in South Florida while the future driver grew up in Miami.
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BOBBY ALLISON: He said to me one night, come on, Bobby, we're going to the car races. And I saw that car race at age 10, I guess, and really, really was enthused.
YEAGER: Allison began racing in high school. He left Florida in 1959, looking for better opportunities and settled in Hueytown, Alabama, near Birmingham. He became part of a group of drivers dubbed the Alabama Gang. A fierce competitor, Allison began racking up the accomplishments - three-time winner at Daytona, four-time winner at Talladega, series champion in 1983. He won 85 races. Allison changed NASCAR, although perhaps unintentionally. A fistfight at the 1979 Daytona 500 with two other drivers, his brother, Donnie Allison and Cale Yarborough, helped catapult the sport before a national audience. Then during a 1987 race at Talladega, heard in a broadcast provided by NASCAR...
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UNIDENTIFIED SPORTSCASTER #1: Oh, we got a problem.
UNIDENTIFIED SPORTSCASTER #2: ...Blown a tire.
YEAGER: Allison's engine blew. Ripping a tire, he went airborne.
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UNIDENTIFIED SPORTSCASTER #1: Bobby Allison with a horrible crash here on the front stretch. It has torn out a complete section of protective railing separating...
YEAGER: Allison walked away, and it's considered the prime reason NASCAR instituted restrictor plates to slow down cars. In a 2019 interview with WBHM, Allison said that was a good move.
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ALLISON: I feel like the restrictor plate is the best, most fair thing that they ever did because it did the same thing to everybody.
YEAGER: For all his success, Allison also suffered tragedy. His two sons, Davey and Clifford, followed him into racing. Clifford Allison died in 1992 in a crash during a practice run at a track in Michigan. Less than a year later, Davey Allison was piloting a helicopter and crashed at the Talladega Superspeedway. Bobby Allison's racing career ended in 1988 after an accident at the Pocono Raceway left him with life-threatening injuries.
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ALLISON: My biggest question was - why didn't I die?
YEAGER: Racing historian Buz McKim says Allison started in NASCAR before the days of big sponsorship money, when some drivers lived hand to mouth. He calls Allison a driver's driver.
BUZ MCKIM: He was an incredible engineer, too. He built a lot of his own cars, and his cars were very advanced for the time. But he would race anywhere, any time. If he could, he would race seven days a week. And I don't think I've ever seen anybody as diligent as he was or as good for the sport.
YEAGER: Allison had a stint as a car owner. He was a frequent personality at NASCAR events, meeting fans and signing autographs, quick to promote the sport he loved, a champion for racing, both on and off the track. For NPR News, I'm Andrew Yeager in Birmingham.
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