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1981 NASCAR Winston Cup Series season
Previous: 1980 Next: 1982

The 1981 NASCAR Winston Cup Series began on Sunday, January 11 and ended on Sunday, November 22. Darrell Waltrip won his first Winston Cup championship by 53 points over Bobby Allison. Ron Bouchard was crowned NASCAR Rookie of the Year.

Season recap[]

Date Event Circuit Winner
January 11 Winston Western 500 Riverside International Raceway Bobby Allison
February 8 Busch Clash Daytona International Speedway Darrell Waltrip
February 15 Daytona 500 Daytona International Speedway Richard Petty
February 22 Richmond 400 Richmond Fairgrounds Raceway Darrell Waltrip
March 1 Carolina 500 North Carolina Motor Speedway Darrell Waltrip
March 15 Coca-Cola 500 Atlanta International Raceway Cale Yarborough
March 29 Valleydale 500 Bristol International Raceway Darrell Waltrip
April 5 Northwestern Bank 400 North Wilkesboro Speedway Richard Petty
April 12 CRC Rebel 500 Darlington International Raceway Darrell Waltrip
April 26 Virginia 500 Martinsville Speedway Morgan Shepherd
May 3 Winston 500 Alabama International Motor Speedway Bobby Allison
May 9 Melling Tool 420 Nashville Speedway Benny Parsons
May 17 Mason-Dixon 500 Dover Downs International Speedway Jody Ridley
May 24 World 600 Charlotte Motor Speedway Bobby Allison
June 7 Budweiser 400 Texas World Speedway Benny Parsons
June 14 Hodgdon 400 Riverside International Raceway Darrell Waltrip
June 21 Gabriel 400 Michigan International Speedway Bobby Allison
July 4 Firecracker 400 Daytona International Speedway Cale Yarborough
July 11 Busch Nashville 420 Nashville Speedway Darrell Waltrip
July 26 Mt. Dew 500 Pocono Raceway Darrell Waltrip
August 2 Talladega 500 Alabama International Motor Speedway Ron Bouchard
August 16 Champion Spark Plug 400 Michigan International Speedway Richard Petty
August 22 Busch 500 Bristol International Raceway Darrell Waltrip
September 7 Southern 500 Darlington International Raceway Neil Bonnett
September 13 Wrangler SanforSet 400 Richmond Fairgrounds Raceway Benny Parsons
September 20 CRC Chemicals 500 Dover Downs International Speedway Neil Bonnett
September 27 Old Dominion 500 Martinsville Speedway Darrell Waltrip
October 4 Holly Farms 400 North Wilkesboro Speedway Darrell Waltrip
October 11 National 500 Charlotte Motor Speedway Darrell Waltrip
November 1 American 500 North Carolina Motor Speedway Darrell Waltrip
November 8 Atlanta Journal 500 Atlanta International Raceway Neil Bonnett
November 22 Winston Western 500 Riverside International Raceway Bobby Allison

Notable Races[]

  • Western 500 – The final race where 115-inch wheelbase cars were eligible to run, the field was a mix of 1977 racecars and 1981 models. Dale Earnhardt drove a 1981 Pontiac while race winner Bobby Allison drove a 1977 Monte Carlo.
  • Daytona 500 – The new cars proved to be disturbingly ill-handling and there were several airborne crashes in testing and preliminary events. NASCAR increased spoiler size twice during the week to keep the cars on the ground. The ensuing 500 saw only four minor cautions and 49 lead changes. Bobby Allison drove a 1981 Pontaic Lemans whose sloped rear glass made it more stable and faster, but Richard Petty got out to the lead after his last pitstop by not changing tires; once in the lead he was uncatchable by Allison as he took his seventh 500 win.
  • Richmond 400 – Darrell Waltrip drove Junior Johnson's Buick to his first win of the season, edging Ricky Rudd, driving Waltrip's former car, the DiGard Oldsmobile. Bobby Allison wrecked his Pontiac Lemans and drove Butch Lindley's car rather than run a backup Oldsmobile in the team's shop for fear NASCAR would use the existence of the backup to justify banning the Lemans altogether.
  • Atlanta 500 – Team owner Harry Ranier protested NASCAR-mandated spoiler reduction to the Pontiac Lemans the team was running but got no support from rival teams. Cale Yarborough edged Harry Gant for the win while Dave Marcis flipped violently after sliding hard into a mammoth truck tire shielding the pit wall abutment.
  • Rebel 500 – Waltrip edged Gant, who was making his debut in a Pontiac Grand Prix owned by Burt Reynolds and Hal Needham. Bobby Allison debuted a new Buick as the team gave up on the Lemans because of NASCAR spoiler reduction on the car.
  • Virginia 500 – Rookie Morgan Shepherd dominated en route to his first career Grand National win.
  • Winston 500 – Allison slugged it out with Waltrip, Rudd, and Buddy Baker en route to a wild last-lap win.
  • World 600 – Allison won in a crash-torn race in which his brother Donnie suffered a serious leg injury.
  • Michigan 400 – After 50 lead changes Bobby Allison was running seventh when Kyle Petty's blown engine sent four of the top six in the field spinning in Turn Two while race leaders Dale Earnhardt and Darrell Waltrip crashed in Turn Three. The win put Allison nearly 300 points ahead of Waltrip in the standings. Following the race Earnhardt's team owner Rod Osterlund sold the team to J.D. Stacy.
  • Talladega 500 – Bobby Allison led the most laps but slipped back in the final laps, leaving Darrell Waltrip, Terry Labonte, and rookie Ron Bouchard in contention for the win. On the final lap in Talladega's trioval Labonte swung high on Waltrip and as the two jostled Bouchard dove to the bottom and beat them to the stripe by inches.
  • Yankee 400 – Richard Petty stormed past five cars with five laps to go and held off Waltrip and Ricky Rudd in the most competitive race of the season (65 lead changes among 14 drivers).

Final Point Standings[]

  1. 11-Darrell Waltrip 4880
  2. 28-Bobby Allison 4827
  3. 33-Harry Gant 4278
  4. 44-Terry Labonte 4052
  5. 90-Jody Ridley 4002
  6. 88-Ricky Rudd 3988
  7. 2/3-Dale Earnhardt 3975*
  8. 43-Richard Petty 3880
  9. 71-Dave Marcis 3507
  10. 15-Benny Parsons 3449
  • Earnhardt drove races 1–20 in the #2 Rod Osterlund Wrangler Jeans Pontiac Grand Prix but left the team when Osterlund sold it to J.D. Stacy. He finished the season driving for Richard Childress in the #3 Wrangler Pontiac Grand Prix.

External links[]

NASCAR Sprint Cup Series seasons

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Smallwikipedialogo.png This page uses some content from Wikipedia. The original article was at 1981 NASCAR Winston Cup Series. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with Autopedia, the text of Wikipedia is available under the GNU Free Documentation License.


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