KING RICHARD I: THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY of AMERICA'S GREATEST AUTO RACER by Richard Petty with William Neely

Originally published in 1986.

Richard Petty is NASCAR's winningest driver, with 200 wins. He raced from 1958-1992. He won seven championships, he won the Daytona 500 7 times and is one of the few drivers to win at every track he competed on during the course of his career. In 1967 he won 10 races in a row (!) on his way to winning 27 races for the season. 

He also won the very first NASCAR big time car race I ever saw at Michigan in 1981. 

I was already a fan - and I was sure that he would win every race I attended from the point forward (he didn't).

The Petty family raced in stock car races back when they really were stock cars - you could buy replacement parts at local dealers or in junkyards. They raced when you could drive the car to the track - but that was a bad idea if you were caught up in an accident and couldn't drive it back home.

They got in on the ground floor of NASCAR, with Richard Petty's dad winning 3 of the early championships and Richard, his brother, and his cousin serving as his underaged pit crew and car builders.

Petty's story is interesting enough, but because his story coincides with so much of the early history of NASCAR, it also tells their history as well - especially from the beginning to the mid-1970s. One could easily say that Richard Petty and NASCAR grew up together.

I found this to be an enjoyable well-told autobiography/history. Very well told. The cover quotes Playboy magazine as saying that King Richard I was "The best sports book of the year." They may have been right - it is very good.

I rate this book 5 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: King Richard I: The Autobiography of America's Greatest Auto Racer.

RACER by John Andretti and Jade Gurss

 

Published by Octane Press in September of 2020.

I thoroughly enjoyed this autobiography because John Andretti was my favorite race car driver - period. 

I have watched auto racing for as long as I can remember. Some of my earliest memories are going to qualifications for the Indy 500. I have Janet Guthrie's autograph - not realizing when I got it that it was actually an amazing autograph to have. The sound of a single car circling the track with the roar and whine of the engine (it has both sounds at the same time) echoing off of the stands makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up. The history at that track cannot be topped by any other venue in the world.

I attended my first NASCAR race at Michigan in 1981 with my father. The spectacle of the whole thing was amazing. It was won by my favorite driver at the time, Richard Petty. In 1986, we went to our first Indy 500 and haven't missed one since (the 2020 race doesn't count since no spectators were allowed due to Covid-19). 

John Andretti first came to my attention as the cousin and nephew of his more famous relatives, Michael and Mario Andretti. He was like an also-ran compared to them because he didn't come with fully-funded top-notch rides and I paid him little attention - he had the famous name but I wasn't particularly fond of his cousin Michael Andretti. Michael had a reputation for complaining about everything and everyone. He has gotten much better as an owner and I have to say I am truly a fan of the way he manages his IndyCar teams.

So, when a local Indianapolis radio station started to interview him every week I listened with some serious skepticism. Before long, I found that I had a lot in common with John. We were born in the same hospital (5 years apart) and I live on the West Side of Indy, where he grew up. It became clear that he was much more of a regular guy race car driver than his more famous cousin. Plus, he had a great sense of humor. 

Soon enough, his segment became "must listen" radio for me and I became a fan. He started a go-kart race as a joke competition with one of the on-air personalities and raised money for Riley Children's Hospital in Indianapolis. It became know as the Race for Riley. I attended a few of them as the event grew from just a few thousand dollars to raising hundreds of thousands at a time (almost $5 million at the time this book was published). In fact, a portion of the purchase price of the hardcover edition of this book goes to Race for Riley.

John Andretti really lies at the intersection of my racing interests. I love the Indy 500 - and so did he. My favorite driver in NASCAR was Richard Petty and I was the absolute happiest as a fan when John drove Petty's 43 car. And John was the first driver to race the Indy 500, climb on a plane and then fly to Charlotte, North Carolina to race in NASCAR's longest race - the World 600 (as it was called then).

John's reaction when he discovered he had colon cancer was not surprising. His was so advanced when he found out that he really had almost no chance. He went out of his way to let people know that that was easily preventable and they could learn from his example and get a colonoscopy early on to have a better result. I did - one month before his death. And, it was a good thing, too! Thanks, John. 

Having heard John in several year's worth of weekly interviews, I can tell you that this book does have the true feel of his voice, which says a lot for his ghost author Jade Gurss. Gurss seems to specialize in racing-related books, which had to be a big help for writing this one.

The last page of this book hit me like a ton of bricks, even though I knew exactly how it ended. 

Left to Right: Richard Petty, John Andretti and
Michael Andretti. John ran a car with Richard
Petty's traditional colors for his cousin's
team in the 2010 Indy 500.

There are four forwards to the book and they are a testament to John Andretti's level of connection in the racing community: Mario Andretti, A.J. Foyt, Michael Andretti and Richard Petty. This is a collection of American racing royalty that is unrivaled. 

So, there is my mess of a review of a book that I absolutely enjoyed. I rate this book 5 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: RACER by John Andretti and Jade Gurss.

Johnny Rutherford: Indy Champ by Hal Higdon

Kids Book, but still an interesting read for Indy 500 fans

Published in 1980 by G.P. Putnam's Sons

Johnny Rutherford: Indy Champ is a short biography aimed at elementary/middle school aged readers. It has 123 pages of text and 2 pages of end notes and is part of the extensive series of sports biographies known as the Putnam Sports Shelf.

Rutherford (by rear wing) and his car
at the 1975 Indy 500.

Even though I am long past the targeted audience for this book, I found it to be entertaining and informative. Higdon's roots as a magazine writer shine throughout the book - the text is lively throughout.

For those who do not know, Johnny Rutherford is a three-time winner of the Indy 500 with wins in 1974, 1976 and 1980. He was known as a hard luck driver until he broke through and finally started to win. His wins are even more remarkable when you consider he raced and won against all three four-time winners of the Indy 500 (A.J. Foyt, Al Unser, Sr. and Rick Mears) and other legendary Indy 500 drivers such as Mario Andretti and Tom Sneva.

The book emphasizes Rutherford's humble beginnings in racing and his struggle to get quality equipment and to even finish the Indy 500. He used to joke and say, "If I ever finish this race, I'm going to win it." That is exactly what he did in 1974.

This book captures his approachable manner and "good guy" personae very well. The on track action is described very well. It also covers his 1963 appearance in the Daytona 500. It was published just before he won the 1980 Indy 500.

I rate this book 5 stars out of 5.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: Johnny Rutherford: Indy Champ.

Reviewed on May 17, 2013

Speedweeks: 10 Days At Daytona by Sandra McKee

Disappointing

So, Speedweeks: 10 Days At Daytona is yet another coffee table book. See, what it is is that I have a friend who knows I am a NASCAR fan so he didn't know what else to get me for Christmas so he got me 3 NASCAR books. One of them was this one and I was fairly disappointed, mostly due to the fact that the title does not accurately describe the book. Nor does it accurately describe Speedweeks, 

Daytona Speedweeks is a racing happening - a racing festival. There are a multiple motorsports events, culminating in the Daytona 500. Check their website!

This book, however, focuses primarily on the Daytona 500 (90%) and barely mentions the other events. In fact, some events it doesn't mention at all. I have no problem with the NASCAR Cup level focus, just give the book a different title, like The Daytona 500. This, truly, is a book that you cannot judge by its title.

I give this book 2 stars out of 5. The title thing annoyed me, but there was also nothing here about the history of the speedway or of the race. Beautiful book but not much here of substance.

This book can be purchased on Amazon here: Speedweeks: 10 Days At Daytona.
 
Reviewed in February of 2005 (edited in 2011 and 2025 to update the events offered during Speedweeks)..

Daytona: From the Birth of Speed to the Death of the Man In Black by Ed Hinton

Great book but there are a few errors

Originally published in 2001.

The title basically says it all. This fascinating book uses Daytona International Speedway and the old racing surface of Daytona Beach itself as its lens to focus on the world of NASCAR. Hinton has been a beat reporter covering NASCAR since the mid-1970s and knows all of the old stories and Hinton is able to package them so that the reader is reading one little vignette after another until the history of Daytona is told.

I was reading another book when I picked up this one (a Christmas gift that I hadn't really paid a lot of attention to) and began thumbing through it. I couldn't put it down! It is well-written and at times it is laugh out loud funny, especially if you are a NASCAR fan and are familiar with the older, retired drivers.

However, a couple of disturbing, trivial factual errors throw a negative light on the book as a whole. Two that I noted were Hinton's assertion that no rookie has won the Indy 500 since the 1926 race (in case you're wondering, Daytona Beach used to be used as a high-speed test site, much like Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah is used today and the 1926 winner died making such a high-speed run). I knew that his assertion was wrong since I witnessed rookies win the 2000 race (Juan Montoya) and the 2001 race (Helio Castroneves) - both were well-before publishing time for his book. Besides that, 2 minutes on Google told me there were two others - the 1927 and 1966 winners.

The Dukes of Hazzard  
in a car chase

Willy T. Ribbs

Secondly, he makes the assertion that California driver Willy T. Ribbs was encouraged by the example set by the TV show The Dukes of Hazzard to get drunk and play chasing games with the police in downtown Charlotte, NC in May of 1978. Since I spent a great deal of my own childhood watching the Dukes, I thought that that seemed a bit early. Sure enough, two more minutes on Google told me that the show premiered in January of 1979, so it really had no part in Ribbs' ill-conceived misadventures. Oddly enough, Ribbs' trip to the drunk tank gave Dale Earnhardt the chance to take his car - his first chance to drive a good car in the Winston Cup Series and this opportunity eventually led him to the career that made him a household name.

Despite these errors the book was a hoot to read and I'm sure I'll be lending it to every NASCAR fan I know.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: Daytona: From the Birth of Speed to the Death of the Man in Black.

I rate this book 5 stars out of 5.

Reviewed on July 26, 2004.