Ranking the Most Dominant Seasons in NASCAR History
The biggest seasons in NASCAR's history span generations, from the Red Scare to the oughts.
It's tough to compare eras, because the competition has been far greater in recent decades than it was during NASCAR's toddler years. During Richard Petty's championship years, there were an average of 8.7 winners on the circuit each season, according to Sporting News' Jeff Owens. Compare that to when Jimmie Johnson was dominating, when an average of 14 drivers won a race.
Race wins, top-fives and top-10s are integral to this list, as is winning the championship, though the latter wasn't necessary, merely a cherry on top.
Who knows? Maybe someone will emerge from the 2015 crop of drivers to threaten this list.
Read on to see 10 of the biggest seasons in NASCAR history.
10. Bobby Isaac, 1969
1 of 10
Wins: 17 in 50 starts
Kicking off this list is Bobby Isaac, who started an amazing 50 races in 1969, winning 17. Throw in 29 top-fives and 33 top-10s, and it's clearly one of the more impressive seasons in NASCAR history.
He gets knocked down several pegs, however, because he finished only 31 of those races.
Isaac retired because, as the Orlando Sentinel's Juliet Macur wrote, "he said, a voice in his head told him to get out." IMDb speculates Days of Thunder character Buddy Bretherton is based on Isaac, as another character in the movie "mentions that Buddy heard voices while driving."
He did lead 5,072 of the 12,308 laps, so there's that to remember if you can't find any other cultural landmarks in the summer of 1969.
9. Bill Elliott, 1985
2 of 10
Wins: 11 in 28 starts
Bill Elliott was a boss in 1985, and he didn't even win the championship.
On the track, Elliott won 11 races in just 28 starts with 18 top-10s.
"It was 1985, however, that would put Bill Elliott on the map. He dominated the 1985 season, winning three (Daytona 500, Winston 500, Southern 500) of NASCAR's big four (Daytona 500, Winston 500, World 600, Southern 500) and winning $1 million, giving him the nickname "Million Dollar Bill."
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Unfortunately, he didn't win the championship due to two crashes early in the season and a busted transmission. It left him just 101 points shy of the title.
The greater resonance of Million Dollar Bill's season was that he catalyzed the use of restrictor plates at Daytona and Talladega. Elliott was down two laps at Talladega and caught Cale Yarborough under green to win the race. Soon thereafter, Bobby Allison's car vaulted into the fence, and NASCAR addressed the speed of the cars with restrictor plates.
8. Jimmie Johnson, 2007
3 of 10
Wins: 10 in 36 starts
In 2007, Johnson was near the beginning of one of the most dominant runs the sport has seen. With one title already riding shotgun in the No. 48 Chevy, his 2007 season was as good as they come.
He won four poles, along with 10 races and 20 top-fives.
There's a case for Johnson to be considered the greatest driver of all time. I know this statement just made most NASCAR fans blow milk out of their noses, but winning five titles in a row during an era of much deeper competition is the defendant's case in the People vs. Johnson.
He currently has 70 wins, just six shy of Dale Earnhardt Sr., and with six championships, he is just one behind the Intimidator.
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7. Cale Yarborough, 1978
4 of 10
Wins: 10 in 30 starts
Carl Yarborough belongs on the Mount Rushmore of NASCAR. He was the dominant driver of his era, and in 1978, he won his third championship in row.
Ten wins from 30 starts and 23 top-fives proved just how strong a driver he was. He won nine races in 1976 and 1977, both championship years, but winning 10 races and becoming the first driver to win three straight championships made 1978 the best of this three-year run.
Three times during the season, Yarborough basically went wire-to-wire. In two races at Nashville, he led 831 laps, including all 420 in the Nashville 420. There were only nine laps at Nashville that he ceded to other drivers.
Throughout the rest of the season, he led 300-plus laps three other times.
It becomes easy over time to forget just how good some of these drivers were from an era long gone.
6. Tim Flock, 1955
5 of 10
Wins: 18 in 39 starts
Tim Flock won 18 races in 39 starts in 1955. He also earned 18 poles and 32 top-fives.
Maybe the competition wasn't as stiff as it is today, but he clearly was the best of this group of drivers, certainly in 1955.
He finished in the top five nearly every time he ran. On top of that, he led 3,495 laps out of 6,208 completed for 56 percent of all laps.
"The King" Richard Petty, who would break Flock's record of 18 wins in a season, had this to say about Flock, via NASCARHall.com, "To me, he was a cool customer. You would see a bunch of them drivers running sideways. Tim would just be running around. When the race was over, Tim won. Those other guys were still running sideways."
5. Darrell Waltrip, 1981
6 of 10
Wins: 12 in 31 starts
In 1981, Darrell Waltrip won over a third of his races—39 percent, to be precise. He also nabbed himself 21 top-fives, good for 68 percent of his races.
During this season, he cemented his grip atop the standings by winning four races in a row and going back-to-back on two other occasions. For this year, he was the driver to beat every time out. He led 2,517 laps on the season.
When he won the title, he was presented with the honor in New York City's Waldorf-Astoria in Manhattan, which could be the spark that ignited much of the modern corporate involvement in what was a singularly regional sport.
"It was such a change, taking all those rednecks to New York," Waltrip said, via USA Today. "It was unbelievable. I went on a media blitz and on TV shows I'd never imagined being on and relished it! This was big time. Taking the thing to Wall Street and getting companies wanting to be a part of it. Those were challenging and fun times."
Now, we see pharmaceutical companies, insurance companies, candy companies, Internet companies and others all on board, not just life's vices like cigarettes, booze and motor oil.
4. Dale Earnhardt, 1987
7 of 10Wins: 11 in 29 starts
In 1987, Earnhardt won 11 races and earned 21 top-fives and 24 top-10s from one, count it, one pole.
Either he was terrible at qualifying, or he was surreptitiously lulling the competition into a false sense of security, because Earnhardt then went out and beat their candy bottoms.
This season included the famous "Pass in the Grass" in the Winston at Charlotte. Earnhardt battled Elliott, who cut a tire and fell out of contention but wouldn't relent for the 10-lap skirmish. Elliott said after the race:
"If a man has to run over you to beat you, it's time for this stuff to stop. What he did wasn't right. When a man pulls over and lets you by and then tries to run you into the wall, I'd say that was done deliberately. If somebody doesn't do something about this, we're coming back next week and we'll see what happens.
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To which Earnhardt had little to say, except, "This whole deal is between me and Bill, and it has nothing to do with our teams. We knocked each other around, but it's all over now as far as I am concerned. But if Bill still wants to do something about it, then I'll stand flat-footed with him any day."
3. David Pearson, 1976
8 of 10Wins: 10 in 22 starts
David Pearson, better known as the "Silver Fox," started 22 races in 1976 and won 10 of them, including the Daytona 500 in one of the more memorable finishes you'll ever see.
Richard Petty got spun out by Pearson and skidded across the infield, just yards shy of the finish line. Pearson regrouped his car and drove across the finish.
"I'm not sure what happened," Pearson said after the race. "He went beneath me and his car broke loose. I got into the wall and came off and hit him. That's what started all the spinning."
Petty, sitting just 50 yards from the wire, later said, "It was just one of those racing deals. Pearson would have done the same thing. We didn't have spotters back then, so I didn't know I wasn't clear."
There were other seasons when Pearson won more races, but given how few starts he had and how high he finished when he did race (including Daytona), this season was very memorable for the wily fox.
2. Jeff Gordon, 1998
9 of 10
Wins: 13 in 33 starts
Seventeen years ago, Jeff Gordon was about as dominant a driver on the circuit as there had ever been. His 1998 season may be the best season this side of the 80s.
Gordon finished the season with 13 wins, 26 (!) top-fives and 28 top-10s. In 33 starts, he basically finished inside the top five every time. He finished only five races outside of the top 10, and 26 of his 28 top-10s were actually top-fives.
That's a lot of malarkey to digest, but take a long whiff of Dupont chemicals and let it take you away.
"Gordon had an astonishing average finish of 5.69 after winning his 13th race of the season, the NAPA 500 at Atlanta Motor Speedway on Sunday night. In this decade, an average finish of seventh place would have won every previous championship. From 1990 to 1998, the average finishing average was 8.84.Gordon's average finish would have won the championship not only for every year of the 1990s but for most of NASCAR's 50 seasons.
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Gordon needs eight wins to reach 100 for his career. This is his final season as a full-time NASCAR driver. He's won that many before, and he won four in 2014. You have to think Hendrick Motorsports is going to give this guy every chance at 100 and a shot at that elusive fifth championship.
1. Richard Petty, 1967
10 of 10
Wins: 27 in 48 starts
There's a reason Richard Petty became known as "The King,” and it all started in 1967.
In 48 starts, Petty won 27 races, with 38 top-fives and 40 top-10s. Basically, there wasn't a single race on the circuit where in he wasn't in contention. Petty's Plymouth Belvedere was revamped and ready to take him on an unprecedented run.
From Hemicar.com (via HubGarage.com), "They put a '67 grille and a few pieces of new sheet metal on their year-old car and put it to work in '67. Richard, and the ''66 with a facelift,' won the next race by two laps. There must have been something special about that ol' blue Plymouth. History was soon to be made."
Petty won 56 percent of the races and finished in the top 10 in 83 percent of them.
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