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A note about the film of this race. It was made by the same entity that did the Indianapolis 500 films of the 60s and 70s, Championship Racefilms, which is one reason why there's a heavier than normal emphasis for a NASCAR race on the USAC drivers of the day, such as A.J. Foyt, Parnelli Jones, Troy Ruttman, Len Sutton, and Paul Goldsmith, who had also been a successful NASCAR driver, but by this time, was a standard bearer for USAC's stock car series. The film was narrated by Stu Sanders, who also narrated the 1963 and '64 Indianapolis 500 films. It's also worth noting that 1963 was the year USAC first allowed it's drivers to race in the Daytona 500 (though Parnelli Jones had raced in both the Daytona 500 and Southern 500 before he ever drove at the Indianapolis 500 and Dan Gurney had also driven in the Daytona 500 before he ever drove in the Indianapolis 500, running both races for the first time in 1962).
That was an interesting era of motorsports of the prominent drivers being able to cross-over to compete in other race series. Dan Gurney raced the full Formula 1 Grand Prix race schedule (albeit only 10 races) in 1963, where he finished in the top 3 a total of three-times. Motorsports disciplines have gotten so sophisticated, as well as series schedules being crowded, that we'll never see a current or future eras of racing where drivers will compete in other series outside of their committed specialty; with the exception of the occasional NASCAR driver at IndyCar.
@@bloqk16 And remember that this race came at a time BEFORE the likes of Mario Andretti and Bobby and Al Unser (brother Jerry had been the USAC stock car champion in 1957, but tragically lost his life at Indy in 1959), as well as the Allisons and Cale Yarborough, who actually raced IndyCars for one full season (with Gene White in 1971 as Lloyd Ruby's teammate), came onto the scene. And one of the tragic ironies of what would happen a year later was that, after joining Ford later in '63, Fireball Roberts mentored a few younger drivers, one of which was Dave MacDonald, and both Roberts and MacDonald, who would finish tenth in the 1964 Daytona 500, had the fiery crashes that killed them in the same week in two of America's crown jewel racing events (Roberts in the World 600 and MacDonald, along with Eddie Sachs, in the Indianapolis 500).
Heck I figured the emphasis was on the USAC drivers because they were WINNING. First Goldsmith/Foyt,then Jones, then Gurney. Troy Ruttman, Sal Tovellaand Billy Foster (USAC Stocks) made the film because they spun lol but the6 got equal time with west coast drivers like Clem Proctor and NASCAR regulars Paschal, Weatherly, Pardue.
My dad worked as a flagman in turn nine, not sure what year. Remember sitting in the stands there watching as a kid. I think turn nine was part of a 1/2 mile paved track they ran sprint cars on
Ah! This was back in the era of the iron-man drivers, as a 500 mile stock car road race would take around five hours; as this was a *500 mile* and not a _500 kilometer_ race. I always found it annoying when race series promoters would advertise about the upcoming *500* race length, then in very small print, the _km_ abbreviation.
