May 10 - This day in Petty history - part 1

1966 - Starting from the pole position, Richard Petty leads 159 of 200 laps and wins the Speedy Morelock 200 at Middle Georgia Raceway to notch his 45th career NASCAR Grand National victory.

Tiger Tom Pistone finished second - the only other car on the lead lap with Petty. Now in his 80s, Tiger Tom is still quite active today with a racing parts business and his grandson's racing efforts. With assistance from daughter Chrissy, he is plugged into social media outlets such as Twitter and RacersReunion.com and maintains a personal and parts webpage (including several good photos). A solid interview with Tom was published earlier this year at OneDirt.com - a must read for those who may not be familiar with his background. (One teaser from it is Tom asserts he was the driver originally chosen by Andy Granatelli to be sponsored by STP.)

A bit of history and trivia about Middle Georgia Raceway were included in TMC's November 8, 2011 post about Petty's 1970 win there. Speedy Morelock, for whom the race was named, was a race driver from Macon. He was instrumental in overseeing the development of Middle Georgia Raceway. Petty's win was in the inaugural Grand National race at the track. Eight more GN races would be run at Middle Georgia before NASCAR's top series left the track after the 1971 season.

Article courtesy of Jerry Bushmire

TMC