Stockcar Racing Legend and "Alabama Gang" Member Bobby Allison Dead at 86
A legend in stockcar racing when NASCAR was still stockcar racing and not a woke platform attempting to push poison "political correctness" onto their fanbase (empty seats was the result of that exercise in attempted social engineering, has passed away today .
Bobby Allison began racing right out of high school. He eventually settled in Hueytown, AL (suburb of B'ham). His accomplishments were many. So it was for the entire cadre of racers referred to as The Alabama Gang (Red Farmer, Bobby Allison, Donnie Allison, and Neil Bonnet originally then, joined by Jimmy Means, Bobby's son Davey and others). I miss those guys and racing.
When I was growing up there was a guy living in our community that raced what is now ARCA. Then it was trucks and cars and this guy raced both. Bobby was one of his sponsors and was visiting this fellar one day during the week. They had driven to a local car wash to clean some parts and several people spotted Bobby. It was akin to an Elvis sighting. RIP Mr. Allison.
I am sure there are some on here who remember this.
So sad to hear! A racing legend has left us to go to a better place! He will be reunited with Davey!
ReplyDeleteI drove a de-tuned version of his car at Atlanta Motor Speedway. It was 165 mph of pure fun. Thirty laps wiped me out.
ReplyDeleteThe good ole days. Ole man francis new how to promote, his faggeyt/tranny son is just that,haven’t watched in years, will be decades soon
ReplyDeleteI was a Bobby Allison fan back-in-the-day. Bought a model of his Monte Carlo back-in-the-day. No snap-together crap. Had to use model glue. (I love the smell of model glue in the morning.) Had to paint them too. So I did. Red and gold.
ReplyDeleteOh, yeah, remember it well. I used to watch all the big NASCAR races back then until they started mucking up things. "Stages" in a 500 mile race? WTF!?! get out there like a MAN for 500 miles of tradin' paint! Buncha pussies....
ReplyDeleteI am grateful you posted this sir.
ReplyDeletePre-teen I watched Red, Bobbie and Donnie short track in Huntsville and Birmingham. Always friendly to all attendees. Later saw the Allisons at Talladega ( long before “proud day”). Super excited to meet Davey. Just a regular Joe. Somebody put out a tribute cd to Davey. I got it and played it for my 2 young children. They got to meet him also. He was Super with and towards them. Spoke about 15 minutes with them. Signed son’s Davey/Texaco cap.
Went to college for medicine, first job was at Carraway Med Center Trauma Dept.
Provided initial care for Donnie there prior to admission to the hospital. Bobbie came post haste! Super worried. Inside, I was screaming to ask both if they remembered talking to me as a young squirt in Hsv and Bhm, but could not.
I arranged 3 days from work for the family to go cheer on Davey at Talladega. A few days prior to the race, I was in a Continuing Ed class on what was to be a routine shift in the Trauma Center.
After class, I stopped TC to visit and see how their day was going. Then I learned, one of our flight teams had flown Davey in. Stunned. Had I not been told to attend class that day, I would’ve been in on that situation. I thanked G-d for preventing that. I still wonder how I would’ve reacted had I been there. As you can imagine, Bobbie/Donnie and family were not the same. I don’t wanna say more of the immediate family.
They and people like them Made nascar legendary. True Southers/Appalachian folks.
America needs more like them!
Recently I read they had given Bobbie a win for a contested race against Richard Petty ( I could bend your ear on him also).
Thanks again Mr. Jeffrey to honor the man, the family, the sport, the people!
Thank you.
DeleteHi Irish!!!!,
ReplyDeleteI raise my Beer Glass HIGH!!! .. In Eternal Salute!!... To Bobby!!!!!
Blue skyz Bobby!!!!!!
skybill
I quit watching Nascar when the kids inherited the franchise and took it north and woke. The good ole boys here in the South started racing their moonshine cars and showing off their driving and mechanical skills. As with most things, money stepped in and ruined it. They've now banned the rebel flag , the night before the race parties and have curfews. Give me an old dirt track and a bunch of young hardheaded drivers on a Saturday night anytime.
ReplyDeleteBack when racing was actually racing. None of the current bullshit to cause "excitement"!
ReplyDeleteI used to watch stock car racing whenever it happened to accidentally be on the old rabbit ears tv. Finances and locality kept me from one of the big speedways. But, I dreamed. Eventually, I acquired the long green, but car racing had changed. I hadn't. I was still the same old curmudgeon I had always been. Something about money had ruined another sport. Whether "professional college football" or the Olympics, it all came down to the filthy lucre. Bobbie will be missed. Most of the others that have assumed the mantle of "ex-moonshiners" will not. My favorite movie is still 'Thunder Road'. Robert Mitchum is still the best actor, ever. Bury me face down and kiss my ass.
ReplyDeleteAlway leave your helmet on in a NASCAR fist fight.
ReplyDeleteA real American sport with real American men! My dad and I watched "stock car" races on Sunday afternoons back when Chris (I'm gonna butcher his name) Econamacki reporting from trackside. Much more exciting in those days than now. Can't even watch it anymore.
ReplyDeleteRIP Bobby
When Men Were Men and Women were nervous.
ReplyDeleteNow it's a 200 mph parade of politically correct wannabe's.
RIP Mr. Allison.
More like "three hours of advertising occasionally interrupted by a car race."
DeleteI quit watching it years ago when it became obvious they were trying to put as many product logos on the screen in the shortest time possible.
Paraphrasing a line from the book "Stroker Ace" : "Afterwards, the drivers do a lot of interpretive fighting with tire irons in the parking lot. It's a form of Southern Ballet."
Back in the day of Junior's Co-Cola Machine, I saw Bobby & Richard bang doors all afternoon at Martinsville. Forget who won. Man should have received payment as Monte Carlo salesman of the year. As I recall, Bobby was also a pilot & fair aeronautical engineer - at least patent holder on several devices.
ReplyDeleteDavey was going to be a real long term star - great car driver, helicopters not so much.
ReplyDeleteI believe so too. He was the right driver from the right time period and of the right age to have been molded into a stockcar rockstar like Jeff Gordon. He left way too soon.
DeleteJeffery in Alabama
I used to love Nascar when they raced cars you could buy in the dealership show rooms. Race on Sunday, sell on Monday. But like everything else back then, it's gone. I can't even tell the make of a car anymore without reading the name emblem.
ReplyDeleteI used to love reading car magazines that showed the development of the engines that would be going in NASCAR cars. When's the last time you saw anything about NASCAR engines in a car mag?
ReplyDeleteNot a racer or even much of a fan. Back in high school had a buddy who had an "in" with a guy whose buddy raced on Saturday nights at the Riverside dirt track in KC-down by the river, ya know? I got invited to help and stay out of the way. They had a strict "no alcohol" rule at the track, which meant no beer cans were to be seen. But, track rules said nothing about Dixie cups and no one ever bothered to check to see what was in all those Dixie cups.
ReplyDeleteI think it was Ned Jarrett, said when seeing Bobby and his crew roll into the tracks, they said the boys from Bama are here.
ReplyDeleteHad an old video of Junior Johnson rolling into the winners circle 1960 I think, with Johnny Reb sitting on the hood waving the flag, love it.
RIP Bobby
Back before Sticker headlights and taillights and unibodies. Show me the 2 door Camry in the showroom. Now it's just garbage.
ReplyDelete