SEASON IN REVIEW
North Wilkesboro, North Carolina driver Jimmy Pardue picked up his first LASTCAR Cup Series Championship in 1961, breaking George Parrish’s single-season last-place record in 1955 by scoring five last-place finishes in forty-four starts during a fifty-two-race season. Pardue edged second-place Curtis Crider, soon to become the 1963 LASTCAR Cup Champion, and defending LASTCAR Cup Champion Junior Johnson. Johnson’s three finishes upped his career total to 11, giving him the most last-place finishes in NASCAR Cup Series history.
Pardue was competing in his fifth season in NASCAR Cup Series competition. Running three-fourths of the races in 1960, he racked up his first top-five finish and eleven Top Tens. After racing for multiple different teams, including the first two starts of 1961 for M.J. Black, Pardue returned to driving his own equipment for the first time since 1959, debuting his #54 1960 Chevrolet at Daytona Beach, Florida for the third annual Daytona 500. Engine troubles late in the race knocked Pardue back to the 30th spot in the 58-car field.
The first of Pardue’s five last-place finishes came seven races later on April 20 at Columbia, South Carolina, where his 1959 Chevrolet threw a push rod after five laps. The second came just three days later at Richmond, Virginia on April 23, where a busted A-Frame knocked him out of the 12-car race after 123 laps. Finish number three was another nine races later on June 4 in a 13-car race at Birmingham, Alabama where he was involved in a crash after 3 laps. The fourth came five races after that in Roanoke, Virginia on June 24, a busted radiator the cause after 24 laps following a promising 7th-place start. The fifth finish came in the next-to-last race of the season at Greenville, South Carolina on October 28, where a 4th-place qualifying run went south after a busted distributor 51 laps into the 200-lap event.
Through it all, Pardue still scored three top-five finishes and sixteen Top Tens, improving further from his 1960 season with an 11th-place finish in the points standings. He would compete in the next three seasons, scoring his two Cup Series victories in 1961 and 1962. After moving to an up-and-coming Plymouth team, the 1964 season was setting up to be Pardue’s best yet with 14 Top Fives and 24 Top Tens in fifty starts, but before season’s end, he was tragically killed during a tire test at the Charlotte Motor Speedway in Concord, North Carolina on September 22, 1964.
OTHER LASTCAR HEADLINES
On August 9, 1961, in the annual International 100 at Bowman-Gray Stadium, Sprite scored its first and only last-place finish in NASCAR history. Paul Lyons’ #75 1960 Sprite was flagged off the track after just four laps.
CHAMPIONSHIP STANDINGS
1st) Jimmy Pardue (5)
2nd) Curtis Crider (4)
3rd) Junior Johnson (3)
4th) Allen Franklin, Fred Harb, Joe Jones, Harry Leake, Dave Mader, Lee Reitzel, Doug Yates (2)
5th) George Alsobrook, Buck Baker, Bob Barron, Brownie Brown, Scotty Cain, Bill Clinton, Darel Dieringer, John Hamby, Tommy Irwin, Ken Johnson, Paul Lewis, Paul Lyons, Jimmy Mairs, Buzz McCann, Gus Newman, Jim Paschal, Richard Petty, Tom Pistone, Bob Presnell, Ken Rush, Gene Stokes, Herb Tillman, E.J. Trivette, Roy Tyner, Layman Utsman, Bryant Wallace (1)
