NASCAR Finally Recognizes Bobby Allison as Winner of 1971 Race at Bowman Gray

It took 53 years, but NASCAR has finally correctly righted a wrong that never should have happened in the first place.

On Wednesday, NASCAR CEO Jim France and senior advisor Mike Helton visited former Cup Series champion Bobby Allison and told him he was now officially the winner of an August 6, 1971 race at Bowman Gray Stadium in Winston-Salem, N.C. There was no question the Hall of Fame driver had won the Myers Brothers Memorial 250 on the quarter-mile bullring, but he was in a Grand American Ford Mustang in what was considered a “combination race.”

At the time NASCAR often allowed Grand American teams into Cup Series fields if track operators feared they wouldn’t have enough Cup cars to make a good show. Allison was among a number of Cup drivers running both series that year, including Dave Marcis, Buck Baker, Jim Paschal, and former Daytona 500 winner the late Tiny Lund. Seven of the top-10 finishers in the Bowman Gray race were in the lighter, more nimble Grand American cars.

Ironically, Lund’s victories in two 1971 combination races likely were unofficial factors in Allison getting long-overdue credit for what is now his 85th career victory. That puts the seven-time Most Popular Driver now fourth all-time behind only fellow former champions Richard Petty’s 200, David Pearson’s 105, and Jeff Gordon’s 93.

For years, Allison steadfastly held that NASCAR was wrong to not credit him with the BGS victory even as it recognized Lund’s “combination race” victories at Hickory, N.C. and North Wilkesboro, N.C. in a Chevrolet Camaro. Those two of Lund’s five career victories have been on the books for years. Until Wednesday morning, Allison’s Bowman Gray victory had not been.

In 2017, Allison said this for an Autoweek story: “I really hope that someday somebody will say, ‘Whoa, wait a minute; this is a true mistake,’” he said. “Somebody will say, ‘How can we have a race without an official winner?’ I got the money and the trophy, and I’ve been told the race was in the record book for a year or two, then it wasn’t. If NASCAR is a major sport, then Bowman Gray was a major race. And how can you have a major race without a winner?”

It's unclear what spurred NASCAR to suddenly change its mind and give Allison the victory he had longed for for so long. At age 86 and in failing health, long-time NASCAR fans undoubted will be by heartened that NASCAR has done the right thing.

“For 53 years, the Myers Brothers Memorial 250 was the only race run by NASCAR that did not have an official winner,” France said in making the announcement. “As we began preparations for the upcoming Clash at Bowman Gray Stadium, the topic of that August 6, 1971 race returned to the forefront. We felt it was the right thing to officially recognize Bobby’s win and honor him as an 85-time NASCAR Cup Series winner.”

The 250-lap, 100-mile race was among six in 1971 that included Cup Series and Grand American cars. Allison, who competed in both series, led 138 of the 250 laps in his Mel Joseph-owned No. 49 Mustang. He got the winner’s trophy and the $1,000 check, but the victory never counted toward his career total of what once was 84.

Allison was inducted into the NASCAR Hall of Fame in 2011, its second class. He won five NASCAR national championships: 1983 in the Cup Series, 1964 and 1965 in the Modified Division, and 1962 and 1963 in the short-lived Modified Special Division. He won the Daytona 500 in 1978, 1982, and 1988, and was named one of NASCAR’s 75 Greatest Drivers in 2023.

His 1988 Daytona 500 victory—he beat his son, fellow Hall of Fame driver Davey Allison in a stirring, emotional battle—was the last of his career … until Wednesday. His career ended with serious injuries in a multi-car crash on the first lap of that spring’s Pocono 500.