David Pearson’s victory in the Southern 500 on Sept. 5, 1977, at Darlington Raceway was much more significant than his other accomplishments while driving the Wood Brothers’ No. 21 Mercury.
After all, it was the 99th victory of his storied career. That meant he was one race away from becoming only the second driver in NASCAR’s history to reach triple digits in career wins.
Richard Petty, a NASCAR legend and Pearson’s main rival during the 1970s, had long since recorded his 100th victory.
That came nearly a decade earlier on Aug. 22, 1969, when he won the Myers Brothers 250 at the venerated Bowman Gray Stadium in Winston-Salem, N.C., a short track known to this day for competition mayhem.
For the media in the Darlington press box on the day of Pearson’s victory, it didn’t take long for the speculation to begin – and wagers to be made.
“OK, here’s the deal,” a member of the media said, serving as the self-appointed bookie (a role he played often, by the way). “Pick the race you think Pearson will win to get No. 100. You can pick any race left in this season or any throughout 1978. That’s it. There’s no way he’s going winless for that long.”
It didn’t take long before the bookie was swamped with slips of paper and five-dollar bills. Oh yeah, my money was included.
Before I made my wager, I tried to be analytical. I deduced that because Pearson and the Woods raced only on superspeedways, it wouldn’t be illogical to assume he would win again in 1977.
After all, the remaining races were at Rockingham Speedway, Atlanta – now known as EchoPark Speedway – and Ontario, Calif., and Pearson had won at all of them.
I put my money on Atlanta. I told a buddy what I’d done. He was not impressed.
“Normally, I would agree with you,” he said. “But you have to take into consideration Pearson has won only twice this year. That’s not his usual style, remember?”
He had a point. Pearson and the Woods had been virtually unstoppable for years. They united in 1972, after Pearson had already won 60 races and three NASCAR Cup Series championships.
Their success began almost immediately – and spectacularly. They won 17 races in just two years and by the end of the 1976 campaign, they compiled 20 more victories – 10 in that year alone.
The 1973 season had been astonishing. Racing only on the big tracks, Pearson won 11 times in just 18 events, which meant he was victorious in 61% of the races he entered.
As mentioned, Pearson was victorious 10 times in ‘76 – and he entered just 22 races.
So, given that he had won only once prior to the ‘77 Southern 500, it had certainly been an off-season for Pearson. Given that, perhaps I had made a poor wager after all.
Indeed, my bet didn’t pay off. But it wasn’t that poor. Pearson finished second at Atlanta, two seconds behind Darrell Waltrip.
The majority of the media at Darlington had reasoned that Pearson would win his 100th race in the 1978 Daytona 500. After all, he always ran well there over the years and had recorded some dramatic victories.
But ‘78 was decidedly different. Pearson crashed out of the Daytona 500 to finish 34th. He was in good company. Petty, Waltrip and AJ Foyt also wrecked as Bobby Allison took the victory in Bud Moore’s No. 15 Ford.
The next big track race was Rockingham’s Carolina 500, which covered 500 laps on the 1.017-mile oval. It routinely lasted five hours, making it one of the longest races on the Cup circuit.
Sure enough, Pearson won the race. After he had experienced bad luck at Daytona International Speedway, fate was kind to him at Rockingham.
Late in the race, Benny Parsons tagged the rear of Pearson’s No. 21 Mercury, sending Pearson into a 360-degree spin. Fortunately, his car did not hit anything and Pearson was able to continue undamaged.
“Luck kept me from wrecking the car,” Pearson said. “That’s all there is to it. Benny caught me in the left rear and sent me into a spin. If I had hit the wall or anything else, that would have been it. Sure, I was mad at Benny but when I caught up with him, I decided not to do anything about it. I was sure he didn’t do it on purpose. Besides, sometimes it’s better to be lucky than good.”
At the time, the 100th victory of Pearson’s career was second only to Petty’s 185, which was considered unapproachable – and which it has proven to be.
I talked with Pearson after his winner’s interview in the press box and told him that as far as I knew, no one had picked him to win his 100th race at Rockingham. If someone had, we would have heard some loud cheering.
“So I get the money, right?” a smiling Pearson asked.
Nope. Actually, we all got our five dollars back.
Pearson won six more races during his career, but none with the Woods after 1978.
In an episode that has become part of NASCAR lore, their split occurred after Pearson sped away from a pit stop with loose lug nuts in the 1979 Rebel 500 at Darlington. His No. 21 Mercury came to a screeching halt at the exit of pit road as left-side tires flew off.
Soon after, the Woods announced they were parting ways with Pearson.
“It wasn’t because of Darlington,” owner Glen Wood said. “It had been building up for some time.”
No one ever got an answer as to exactly what “it” was that was building up.
Pearson went on to have a much more rewarding experience later that year at Darlington in the Southern 500.
In another piece of NASCAR lore, he dramatically and unexpectedly won his 10th career race at NASCAR’s oldest speedway. And that is another story.
Steve Waid first started in motorsports journalism since 1972, when he began his newspaper career at the Martinsville (Va.) Bulletin. He spent over 50 years in the profession, first with the Roanoke Times-World News and later as publisher and vice president for NASCAR Scene and NASCAR Illustrated.Steve has won numerous state sports writing awards and several more from the National Motorsports Press Association for his motorsports coverage, feature and column writing.
For several years, Steve was a regular on “NASCAR This Morning” on FOX Sports Net and he was the co-author, with Tom Higgins, of the biography “Junior Johnson: Brave In Life.” In January 2014, Steve was inducted into the NMPA Hall of Fame. Additionally, in 2019 he was presented the Squier-Hall Award by the NASCAR Hall of Fame for lifetime excellence in motorsports journalism.
From 2020 to 2026, Steve was a contributor to Frontstretch with the biweekly column Waid’s World, taking a look back at his time in the sport. In addition to writing for Frontstretch, Steve was also the co-host of The Scene Vault Podcast with Rick Houston.
Sadly, Steve passed away in June 2026 after a lengthy illness. He was 77. Read our tribute to Steve and also watch our tribute podcast to our wonderful colleague and friend.
I miss Rockingham. Fast one mile that was unique in that it ate tires.