Watch Buddy Baker Break The 200mph Barrier On A Closed Course In A Hemi Daytona Charger Circa 1970 – Screaming Elephant At Talladega!

The world had actually by no means seen the likes of something just like Talladega Superspeedway when it opened in September of 1969. Instantly thrust into controversy when NASCAR drivers, led by Richard Petty packed up and left earlier than the scheduled race over security considerations involving tires. The massive, heavy automobiles of the time have been operating speeds far past what they ran at different tracks and the tires that they have been being offered weren’t sturdy sufficient to maintain up with the situations, so Petty gathered the massive title drivers and nearly all of them bolted. It positive didn’t cease Invoice France from patch working a race collectively and giving the tens of hundreds of paying spectators a present. Richard Brickhouse turned a footnote in NASCAR historical past by successful that race, his solely victory in NASCAR.
Wanting to go any points off on the go for the 1970 race, the tire corporations spent all winter engaged on new designs that will stay below the tough situations at Talladega. The one solution to see if their work would bear the specified outcomes was to get a race automotive and a driver onto the monitor and let’em each go as exhausting as they might go to verify the tires have been completely happy. The person was Buddy Baker and the automotive was a blue Dodge Charger Daytona with a full-race Hemi in it. Baker undoubtedly knew that nobody had ever damaged the 200mph barrier on a closed course earlier than so he went out and hammered the automotive exhausting sufficient to do it. No small feat, particularly in an period when brute energy, guts, and the texture within the seat of your pants have been the three primary parts of a profitable driver.
This video exhibits that day, March twenty fourth, 1970. You’ll see and listen to the superior lap and also you’ll additionally see and listen to Baker’s put up run interview the place he drops the phrase “tickled to dying” sufficient that we obtained a bit of weirded out. Kidding, after all. Baker is without doubt one of the sport’s true stars and is considered a genuinely good man. He was definitely the most popular shoe within the inventory automotive racing world as soon as information of this exploit obtained out…and Goodyear in addition to NASCAR noticed match that it did get out, far and vast. Since that first concern at Talladega, issues have been operating on a yearly foundation….with a digital assure of a minimum of one big wreck over the course of the race.
PRESS PLAY BELOW TO SEE SPECTACULAR 1970 FOOTAGE OF BUDDY BAKER BREAKING THE 200MPH BARRIER ON A CLOSED COURSE! THE FIRST MAN TO DO SO!