Benjamin Stewart "Benny" Parsons (July 12, 1941 – January 16, 2007) was an American NASCAR driver, and later announcer/analyst/pit reporter on SETN, TBS, ABC, ESPN, NBC and TNT. He became famous as the 1973 NASCAR Winston Cup champion, and was inducted into the NASCAR Hall of Fame in 2017. He was the older brother of former NASCAR driver, car owner and broadcaster Phil Parsons.
He was nicknamed "BP" and "The Professor" in part because of his popular remarks and relaxed demeanor.
Before NASCAR[]
Parsons was born in Wilkes County, North Carolina. He spent his childhood years in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina and played football for Millers Creek High School in Wilkes County. Following high school, he moved to Detroit, Michigan where his father operated a taxicab company. Parsons worked at a gas station and drove cabs in Detroit prior to entering NASCAR competition. While working at the gas station, a couple of customers towing a race car invited him to a local race track. The driver of the car never showed up for that evening's race, and Parsons drove a race car for the first time later that night.
Driving career[]
1960s[]
Parsons began his NASCAR career by running one race in 1964 for Holman-Moody with a young Cale Yarborough. He qualified ninth driving a 1964 Ford Galaxy, but was unimpressive compared to Yarborough, finishing 21st due to overheating.
Parsons went on and began competing in the ARCA Racing series, competing in 3 races in 1964 and 16 races in 1965, earning the ARCA Rookie of the Year award. He competed in the full season for the first time in 1968 and went on to win the 1968 and 1969 ARCA championships, with a total of 16 wins over the two seasons. He then moved to Ellerbe, North Carolina.
Parsons had three Top 10 finishes in four NASCAR races in 1969.
1970s[]
He joined the circuit full-time in 1970. He was hired by L.G. DeWitt as a substitute driver for Buddy Young, who was injured at Riverside. He had 23 Top 10 finishes in 45 races, a pole at Langley Field Speedway, and finished eighth in the points. He raced in the #72 Ford. Young recovered by the end of the season, but L.G. DeWitt kept Parson's on the team's payroll.
Parsons had 18 Top 10 finishes in 35 starts in 1971, including his first win at South Boston Speedway. He finished eleventh in the points.
In 1972, he had 19 Top 10 finished in 31 races. He finished fifth in the final points standings.
In 1973, he won the NASCAR Winston Cup Championship with only one win, even though David Pearson won eleven races (but Pearson only entered eighteen events). Parsons consistency kept him in contention for the championship: he had 21 Top-10 and 15 Top-5 finishes in 28 events. The team competed with no sponsorship and only 3 cars in the team's arsenal.
During the season finale race, he saw his championship hopes fade as he was involved in a lap 13 crash and his car was heavily damaged. The rest of the garage then joined in to repair Parsons car in hopes of unseating Richard Petty as champion. Parsons miraculously got back on track 136 laps later and finished 25th in the race, taking the Championship. Petty had engine trouble and was relegated to a 35th place finish in the race and a fifth place finish in the final standings, with Cale Yarborough finishing second to Parsons, 67 points behind.
Parsons became the only person (to date) to win both ARCA and NASCAR Cup Series championships.
Parsons finished between third and fifth in the final points from 1974 to 1980. He won the 1975 Daytona 500. He switched to the #27 car for M.C. Anderson starting in 1979. Parsons would win his only race at his home track, North Wilkesboro Speedway, in 1979, after contenders Darrell Waltrip and Bobby Allison crashed out.
1980s[]
In 1980, Parsons won the World 600 at Charlotte and the Los Angeles Times 500 (the final major race at Ontario Motor Speedway) and finished third in points.
In 1981, he starting racing in the #15 Bud Moore Ford. He had a win at Nashville Speedway USA. He won the final race at Texas World Speedway, and won at Richmond. His received his final Top-10 points finish by finishing tenth.
Parsons qualified for the 1982 Winston 500 at Talladega Superspeedway at 200.175 miles per hour (mph), which was the first NASCAR qualification run over 200 mph. He ran the first half of the season for Harry Ranier, and run some of the races between four other teams.
Parsons raced in about half of the races between 1983 and 1986 for owner Johnny Hayes. Parsons' final career victory came at the 1984 Coca-Cola 500 at Atlanta.
He appeared in the 1983 Burt Reynolds movie Stroker Ace.
Parsons resumed full-time racing for Hendrick Motorsports in 1987 as a substitute driver for Tim Richmond, who was stricken with AIDS. During the first lap of a race at Darlington, Parsons hit the wall and badly damaged the car. He was able to continue, but had to make several pit stops for repairs. At one point, crew chief, Harry Hyde, refused to allow Parsons to pit because he and the crew were on an ice cream break. At Martinsville, Hyde, who was notoriously cantankerous, sarcastically told Parsons to hit the pace car on a restart because it was the only thing Parsons had not hit on track. Both incidents were later alluded to in the 1990 movie, Days of Thunder.
Parsons raced the #90 Bulls Eye Barbeque Ford for Junie Donlavey in his final NASCAR season in 1988. He retired from driving at the conclusion of the season and moved to the broadcast booth.
He is also credited for discovering current NASCAR Driver Greg Biffle at a Roush Racing "Gong Show" held in Tucson, Arizona.
Awards[]
- Inducted into the NASCAR Hall of Fame in 2016 as part of the Class of 2017.
- Inducted into the International Motorsports Hall of Fame in 1994.
- Named as one of the NASCAR's 50 Greatest Drivers in 1998.
- Inducted into the Court of Legends at Charlotte Motor Speedway in 1994.
- Inducted into the Motorsports Hall of Fame of America in 2005.
Broadcasting Career[]
Parsons began announcing as a pit reporter in the 1980s on ESPN and TBS while he was still racing part-time. After permanently retiring from racing in 1988, Parsons became a broadcaster, first on ESPN, then with NBC and TNT in 2001. He received an ESPN Emmy in 1996 and the ACE Award in 1989. He appears in his broadcasting role in the video games NASCAR 99, NASCAR 2000, and NASCAR 2001. He appears as an unlockable legend driver in NASCAR 99, NASCAR 2000, NASCAR Rumble, NASCAR Thunder 2002, NASCAR Thunder 2003, and NASCAR Thunder 2004. He featured the NASCAR Thunder games on telecasts between 2001 and 2003 where he took viewers on a virtual ride of each track before every race.
Parsons co-hosted coverage of Winston Cup Qualifying on North Carolina radio station WFMX with Mark Garrow in the early 90s. He continued to co-host a radio program called "Fast Talk" on Performance Radio Network (PRN) with Doug Rice until his death. He also had a podcast available on iTunes, in conjunction with CNN called The CNN Radio Racing Report with Benny Parsons.
Parsons appeared as himself in the 1995 children's video "NASCAR For Kids - A Day At The Races" acting as the host.
In 2005, Parsons made a cameo appearance as himself in the movie Herbie: Fully Loaded. In 2006, he again appeared as himself in Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby.
Illness and Death[]
Parsons began having trouble breathing in the summer of 2006. He was diagnosed with lung cancer. He later announced that the treatment had been successful, and that he had a clean bill of health. Parsons had smoked, but stopped in 1978.
His health prevented him from attending a ceremony in November 2006 where he was to be presented with the Myers Brothers Award, honoring his contributions to racing.
Parsons was admitted to the hospital and placed in intensive care because of complications relating to lung cancer. Parsons died due to complications from lung cancer in the intensive care unit of the Carolinas Medical Center in Charlotte, North Carolina, on January 16, 2007. He is buried near his childhood home in Purlear, North Carolina, which is now the site of Benny Parsons' Rendezvous Ridge.
External links[]
- Benny Parsons at NASCAR.com
- Driver's statistics at racing-reference.com
- Benny Parsons at the International Motorsports Hall of Fame
- "Fast Talk with Benny Parsons" radio show
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