Official name Music City USA 420 | ||
Date May 7, 1977 (1977-May-07) Location Nashville Speedway, Nashville, Tennessee Course Permanent racing facility
0.596 mi (0.959 km) Distance 420 laps, 250.3 mi (402.8 km) Weather Hot with temperatures approaching 86 °F (30 °C); wind speeds up to 15 miles per hour (24 km/h) | ||
The 1977 Music City USA 420 was a 420-lap race that took place on May 7, 1977, at Fairgrounds Speedway in Nashville, Tennessee.
Contents
Background
Nashville Speedway was converted to a half-mile paved oval in 1957, when it began to be a NASCAR series track. The speedway was lengthened between the 1969 and 1970 seasons. The corners were cut down from 35 degrees to their present 18 degrees in 1972.
Summary
The race itself took two hours, fifty-one minutes, and forty seconds from the first green flag to the checkered flag. Benny Parsons was the race winner with an average speed of 87.49 miles per hour (140.80 km/h) while the pole position winner Darrell Waltrip had a speed of 103.643 miles per hour (166.797 km/h) and finished the race in 3rd place. Cale Yarborough led the race with most number of laps (275) and was the points leader after the race for the NASCAR Winston Cup Series championship. However, Benny Parsons would defeat him by one second.
Twenty thousand people attended this race that had a total prize purse of $56,350 ($222,707.83 in current US dollars). The winner would leave the event earning an incredible $9,565 ($37,803.02 in current US dollars) while the last-place finisher would walk away with a meager $255 in cash earnings ($1,007.82 in current US dollars).
Other notable names include Ricky Rudd, Coo Coo Marlin, Richard Petty, Elmo Langley, and Richard Childress (now the owner of Richard Childress Racing and Childress Vineyards). Paul Dean Holt would retire from NASCAR after this race while Ralph Jones would make his introduction into NASCAR racing during this race.
Finishing order
* Driver failed to finish race