Dodge Nuggets From 1975 Championship Season
· Richard Petty is the most recent NASCAR Sprint Cup Series driver to win the championship behind the wheel of a Dodge. In 1975, Petty scored 13 wins and 21 top fives in 30 races. He scored 24 top-10 finishes – a top 10 in every race where he was running at the finish. The official margin of victory over second-place Dave Marcis was 722 points and clinched the title in race No. 26.
· Dodge had a total of 14 Cup wins in 1975 (Marcis won once) and seven pole positions (four by Marcis and three by Petty).
· The 1975 season was the first where the points system developed by Bob Latford was used. That same system remained in place until the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup was created in 2003, a span of 28 seasons.
· Roger Penske won three races as an owner in 1975 with driver Bobby Allison driving the No. 16 Matador. Allison won at Riverside, Calif. and swept both races at Darlington (S.C.) Raceway.
· 10 Cup races on network television, none of which aired live flag-to-flag, five of which were won by Petty’s No. 43 Dodge Charger.
· NASCAR Hall of Fame driver Darrell Waltrip won his first Cup race in 1975 at Nashville Fairgrounds Raceway.
The Year Was 1975
January – Space Mountain opens in Walt Disney World.
April – Bill Gates and Paul Allen founded Microsoft in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
May – Bobby Unser wins Indianapolis 500 for the second time.
July – Jimmy Hoffa reported missing.
August – Louisiana Superdome opens in New Orleans.
November – Former California Governor Ronald Reagan enters the race for the Republican presidential nomination.
Grammy for Song of the Year – The Way We Were by Barbra Streisand
Academy Award for Best Motion Picture – One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
