Pearson, David

[Joe Fan]

I got to talk to legendary NASCAR driver, David Pearson, at an autograph session on Friday. I asked him if he got the road-racers respect for his 1974 IROC performance. In case you don't know, Pearson finished 4th out of 12 drivers that year in IROC driving Porsche Carreras and all four races were road course races. He finished ahead of drivers like A.J. Foyt, Emerson Fittipaldi and Denny Hulme. See: http://www.irocracing.com/History/1974/1974-history.htm

Pearson said that he liked road racing. He also said he always seemed to get a bad car in IROC.

[Anuauto]

I was at Darlington, SC when he won the Southern 500, substituting (for an injured Dale Earnhart in his rookie year?)in the Jim Stacy No5 Monte Carlo - such a popular win because he had been sacked from his long standing Woods Brothers Mercury ride after the pit lane mix up in the Rebel 500 at the same track the previous spring that saw the wheels literally fall off.

[Steve Holmes]

David pearson raced in selected Trans-Am races in 1967 which didn't clash with his NASCAR duties. It seems he was some kind of amazing natural in a race car regardless of whether he was on oval or circuit.

In the 67 Trans-Am he drove a Mercury Cougar. Ed Leslie sometimes drove the other one, and said this about Pearson: "Pearson was a wonderful driver. Dan Gurney was good, but I felt I could race with him. Parnelli was fast but he tore the car up something terrible and then you could beat him. But there have only been two or three times in my life when I felt I couldn't outrace somebody, and Pearson was one of them. In identical Lotus 23s, I had been as fast as Graham Hill!!! There wasn't anywhere he could go that I couldn't go. That made me feel pretty good. But in identical Cougars, I didn't feel that way around David Pearson!"

Pity he didn't do a bit more circuit racing ay.

[Joe Fan]

It is really a shame that Pearson doesn't generate more accolades for his driving talent because I think he was one of the top ten drivers in motorsports history. He was an extremely talented and smart racer. Darrell Waltrip said that during the early portion of a race, you wouldn't see much of Pearson up front but towards the end of the race, he would drive up next to you during a caution with that trademark cigarette hanging out of his mouth, and you would say, "Where the hell did he come from?" Then he would throw the cigarette out the window and drive away from the rest of the field.

Richard Petty, the late Dale Earnhardt and Jeff Gordon all seem to get plenty of accolades from fans as NASCAR greatest drivers but Pearson ranks second to Petty in wins and he only ran for the championship four years during his career and he won it three times.

[Anuauto]

Apart from Martinsville (Woods Brothers' local track or it paid well?) he only ran the superspeedways in later years, so the win record is even more surprising.

[ensign14]

I think Pearson was the best driver ever to set foot in a stock car. Seriously. Not the greatest because that belongs to Petty, who transcended the sport; but had Pearson run the championship schedule more often I bet he would have finished with 150 or so wins and more than Petty. But look at the record books, it seems that Pearson was faster than anyone over a race. Used his brain.

Met him briefly at Goodwood in 2003. Very modest man who seemed bemused that people here had heard of him.

[skycafe]

He is indeed a modest and shy man. He was not at all comfortable in the lime light, and I can imagine that being recognized and acknowledged in England, years after his career had ended was an enormous surprise for him.

I met him at the Daytona 24 Hour back in 1976, when he ran an older Wood's Brothers Stock Car in a special Nascar class in the race. He was very nice, very polite, and seemed to be having a great time, even if it meant taking a stock car out on a rainy asphalt road course.

[Joe Fan]

Modest is a very accurate adjective to describe David Pearson. He is not a self-promoter but someone who has a resume that could make him thousands of dollars if he did. I am somewhat shocked that there has only been one 1/24th scale diecast car of his ever produced, and that was released in the mid-90s. Yet, you see Darrell Waltrip, Dale Earnhardt Sr, Richard Petty historic diecast versions being churned out all the time.

I was sitting in a hotel bar in Atlanta a few years back and next thing I know, David Pearson comes walking in with his wife. He talked to a few people he apparently knew but by and large, I don't think very many people recognized him. And most of the people in the bar were race fans that were staying at the hotel for the raees at Atlanta that weekend.