Bring the hometown heroes back to Cup

A lot of older race fans – including this one – shed a tear recently at the passing of Paul Radford, the “Ferrum Flash,” one of the last survivors of that 1960s period when modified racing (still largely featuring the coupes) gave way to late model racing as the dominant weekly division at race tracks in the mid-Atlantic states and quite a few other locations. That transition ushered in something of a golden age for local racing, and many of us remember it fondly.

Paul Radford was 94. He came across as quiet, hardly flamboyant, not someone whose personality drew attention. He just let his driving do the talking, and his skillful (and clean) efforts on the track brought many wins and many fans. I’m glad he had a chance to be recognized in his later years.

Just for fun, I looked at both Racing Reference and the Third Turn and found that Paul was not one of those racers of his era to grab the occasional opportunity to challenge the NASCAR Cup regulars. In his entire career, he only drove one Cup race, in 1974, at his home track of Martinsville (Ferrum, Va., is about 30 miles north of the speedway). He seems to have shown up with a Dodge but then ended up driving Junie Donlavey’s Ford, which was supposed to have been driven by Charlie Glotzbach. Radford qualified a creditable ninth but exited the race with engine problems after just 20 laps. (Richard Petty’s engine let go two laps later.)

So for his only Cup effort, Paul Radford finished last (30^th), hardly representative of his storied career.

He also drove a couple of races in the Grand American/Grand Touring Division and was an occasional competitor in what is what most recently was the Xfinity Series, back when local drivers made up most of the field. Most of those appearances were at Martinsville or the relatively near-by Bristol. His bread and butter, though, was weekly racing and special events for the regular weekly modifieds and late models. He was still winning races in 1983 – according to the Third Turn, he finished 16^th in the NASCAR Weekly Racing Series, Mid-Atlantic Region, and had victories at several tracks at age 61.

I have no doubt that, given decent equipment and a little time to get used to whatever he was driving, Paul Radford could have competed quite well against the stars of what was first the Grand National Division and then Winston Cup. I also think there are racers out there who could do the same thing today.

When the World of Outlaws or High Limit national sprint car series come to my piece of the world in south central Pennsylvania, one of the biggest fan attractions is whether the locals, collectively known as the Pennsylvania Posse, can beat the traveling stars. Not infrequently, they do, and that creates even more interest for the next race. Is NASCAR missing something here?

(I know, I’ve been over this territory before, but with attendance and TV ratings not having done all that well this year, maybe it’s time to remind NASCAR that some old practices worked then and might just work again now.)

Paul Sawyer used to regularly promote locals when they could get rides for his Cup events in Richmond. Unless they were driving for Junie Donlavey, they basically had no chance, but we still came out to see them, and I have no doubt it boosted the crowd.

Ray Hendrick of Richmond, my hero, drove 17 Cup races over 18 years and had a pair of top-5 finishes. Sonny Hutchins, his arch-rival, had the advantage of driving for Donlavey locally and occasionally in Cup, He ran 38 races over a nineteen-year period and had four top-5s, including a runner-up to Richard Petty in the first race ever run at Dover (1969) and a second to Bobby Allison at Richmond later that year. He wasn’t on the same lap with the leader either time, but he beat 30 and 23 other cars, respectively.

There was a lot of interest when local racing king Bubba Pollard got a shot to run a JR Motorsports car in Richmond’s Xfinity race in 2024 (at age 37), and his sixth-place finish didn’t send anybody away unhappy – except maybe Bubba, who would have liked to have done better, no doubt.

Increasingly today, we are seeing new drivers make their way through the weekly racing ranks to NASCAR’s top rung, and that’s a good thing, even if some of them move up too quickly to develop a strong fan base prior to reaching Cup. But to reach the top these days, you have to get a full-time ride with one of the charter teams. Yes, there are a handful of other cars, but they offer few opportunities to run anywhere near the front of the field.

That, to this old-timer/curmudgeon/critic, is where a fix is needed, but it’s unlikely if not impossible, given the charter system. Still, if NASCAR would give non-charter teams a fair share of the purse, maybe some reasonably competitive part-time teams might be a possibility, perhaps with local hot shoes filling the seats – both in the cars and in the stands.

Some of this is happening, at least in a way, in the Craftsman Truck Series. Last winter’s Pensacola Snowball Derby winner Kaden Honeycutt, this year’s Winchester 400 winner Ty Majeski, and this year’s Nashville All-American 400 winner Dawson Sutton, already have truck series rides, leaving only Martinsville ValleyStar Credit Union 300 winner Landon Pembelton without his first foot on the ladder.

(A quick note: I frequently argue that drivers should spend more time “in the trenches” to build up a base of fans before hitting the big time, and this is a young group, with only Majeski over 30. I wish they were a little older, but shooting for the stars before you can drive there seems the way of the racing world today, sadly.)

But as we’ve seen with Corey Heim (who also would have been a ValleyStar winner, had he not been DQ’d after taking the checkers in 2018, when he was just 16), success in a truck doesn’t necessarily get you a Cup ride, with charters limiting the serious cars (some of which aren’t THAT serious) to 36, with no chance for a better team to bump a slacker from those ranks. With a different NASCAR approach to teams, a new outfit might just push Heim or Honeycutt or Majeski or Sutton or Pembelton to stardom.

And I think that, even though he never really tried it, Paul Radford would have approved.

Frank’s Loose Lug Nuts

I’ve started planning for 2026 (an act of optimistic faith at my age) and have a hit list in its early stages of races and tracks I hope to attend. As of now, there are no Cup races on that list, and I doubt there will be, although I could be wrong; I almost went to Richmond last year.

Take a look online for the tracks near you, series that run races near you, and races at places not near you but worth the travel. Racing remains exciting in ways that no other sport can equal, and I’m hopeful (prayerful) that I have a few years left to attend events in person. Don’t let that opportunity slip by for you.

(COVER PHOTO – Paul Radford had some of his best seasons in this late model sportsman car, shown here at Old Dominion Speedway in Manassas, Va., in 1971. Photo is from Brian Tidball’s collection.)