1987 Goody's 500

1987 Goody's 500

Race details
Race 24 of 29 in the 1987 NASCAR Winston Cup Series season
Map of the track
Date	September 27, 1987 (1987-September-27)
Location	Martinsville Speedway (Martinsville, Virginia)
Course	Permanent racing facility 0.525 mi (0.844 km)
Distance	500 laps, 262.5 mi (442.4 km)
Weather	Temperatures ranging between 57 °F (14 °C) and 80.1 °F (26.7 °C); maximum sustained wind speed of 6 miles per hour (9.7 km/h)[1]
Average speed	76.41 miles per hour (122.97 km/h)
Pole position
Driver	Geoffrey Bodine	Hendrick Motorsports
Most laps led
Driver	Dale Earnhardt	Richard Childress Racing
Laps	170
Winner
No. 17	Darrell Waltrip	Hendrick Motorsports
Television in the United States
Network	SETN
Announcers	Eli Gold Jerry Punch

The 1987 Goody's 500 is a NASCAR Winston Cup Series racing event that occurred on September 27, 1987 at Martinsville Speedway in the American community of Martinsville, Virginia.

Summary

There were 31 American-born drivers on the starting grid; Buddy Baker was credited with the last-place finish due to an issue with his brakes on lap 39 (of 500).^[2] Bonnett would break his wrists during this race but kept on racing as nobody was eliminated from the race yet during lap 40. Most of the drivers who failed to finish the race had problems with either crashing into other drivers, their engine, or with overheating.^[3] Former NASCAR driver Bryan Baker attempted to qualify for the field but failed to make it; this race would have been his Winston Cup Series debut had he qualified. His only professional stock car racing event came at the 1986 Delaware 500.

During the closing laps of the race, a closely packed racing trio (consisting of Earnhardt, Labonte and Waltrip) would constantly bang on each other for the chance to finish the race as the winner.^[4] Those three drivers raced in a similar manner to current NASCAR Sprint Cup Series drivers Tony Stewart, Jeff Gordon and Jimmie Johnson.^[4] Geoffrey Bodine would clinch the pole position for this race with an incredible qualifying run of 91.218 miles per hour (146.801 km/h).^[2] Darrell Waltrip managed to "intimidate" Dale Earnhardt by being nearly two seconds faster than him.^[2] Waltrip became a father just ten days prior to the race with the birth of his oldest daughter Jessica Leigh. This is similar to current drivers Jimmie Johnson and Jeff Gordon winning races after the births of their respective daughters (Genevieve Marie for Johnson and Ella Sofia for Jeff Gordon).

Other notable drivers in this race were Terry Labonte, Neil Bonnett, Alan Kulwicki, Bill Elliott and Michael Waltrip.^[2] Forty-four thousand fans would see almost three and a half hours of racing with eight caution flags being handed out for a staggering 35 laps.^[2] Darrell Waltrip's oldest daughter Jessica would be born just 10 days prior to this race.^[5] Both Richard Petty and his son Kyle participated in this racing event.^[2] Waltrip would earn $43,830 out of the prize purse ($90,060.76 in today's money) while last-place finisher Baker would acquire a meager $1,160 ($2,383.54 in today's money).^[3]

Finishing order

* Driver failed to finish race

References