Harry Hartz in a Duesenberg won the 150 mile AAA Championship race, as 40,000 spectators were on hand at the 1.25 mile, 38 degree banked board San Francisco Speedway opening in San Carlos, California.
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1950
Curtis Turner won a hard fought NASCAR Grand National race on the 1 mile dirt Langhorne (PA) Speedway. 5 different drivers exchanged the lead 7 times over the 150 laps.
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1967
Darel Dieringer scored a wire-to-wire victory in the NASCAR GN 'Gwyn Staley Memorial 400' on the 5/8 mile paved North Wilkesboro Speedway in North Wilkesboro, North Carolina. Owner Junior Johnson had just put a 374 cubic inch motor in Dieringer's Ford stating that the 427 c.i. motors were a disadvantage when it came to fuel use & tire wear.
Dan Gurney drove a Mercury Cougar to victory in the 'Green Valley 300' SCCA Trans-Am race on the 1.6 mile Green Valley Raceway in Smithfield, Texas. The Texas state flag dropped to signal the LeMans style start with drivers running to their cars. Ron Dykes jumped into the lead in a Mustang and at the end of lap 1 it was Dykes, Freddie Van Beuren and Gurney with Jerry Titus up to 4th after starting 28th on the grid. Titus had rolled his Mustang in final practice the day before and had to run his patched up car in an early morning consolation race to even make the field. On lap 2, Titus passed Gurney and Van Beuren in one fell swoop to move into 2nd and took the lead one lap later with an inside dive around Dykes. Once in front, Titus pulled away. On lap 40, Titus pulled into the pits and stepped out of the car to have ice water poured on him. Titus returned over 2 minutes later, but continued to have problems with the heat, forcing him to make more stops before being relieved by Dykes, who had retired. The practice roll had closed off the left side air ducts, adding to Titus' heat problems on a day with both temperature and humidity in the 90's. With Titus' stop, Parnelli Jones took the lead in his Cougar. Jones led until stalling following his pit stop. The stall cost Jones a lap and gave teammate Gurney the lead. Gurney went on to win by that margin, giving the Lincoln-Mercury Cougar team it's first win in Trans-Am competition.
Rollie Beale wins the USAC Sprint Car race at the Eldora Speedway .
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1972
David Pearson, making his first start in the Wood Brothers Mercury a winning one, drove to victory in the NASCAR GN 'Rebel 500' at Darlington Raceway. It was Pearson's first win in more than a year as he was with the ill-fated CV Enterprises attempt to return Pontiac to GN racing. The Wood Brothers car was vacated by A.J. Foyt, who left to concentrate on Indy Cars. Richard Petty ran with Pearson until 2 unscheduled tire stops dropped him a lap behind. Petty still finished 2nd. Fred Lorenzen made another comeback, this time in the Hoss Ellington Ford, running just behind the lead group until blowing the engine on lap 46.
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1989
Dale Earnhardt won the First Union 400 Winston Cup race over Alan Kulwicki at the North Wilkesboro Speedway, North Wilkesboro, NC. (Click here for the race report.)
Al Unser Jr won the CART Indy Car race at the Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach, Long Beach, CA.