1964 NASCAR Motor Trend 500 - Dave MacDonald 24th in Bill Stroppe Mercury at Riverside 1/19/64

Dave MacDonald in a Bill Stroppe Mercury at Riverside International Raceway in the 1964 NASCAR Motor Trend 500. Dave finished 24th in this race while teammates Darel Dieringer finished 9th. Parnelli Jones 32nd and Rodger Ward 37th. Race was won by Dave's good friend & Shelby Cobra teammate Dan Gurney. (Three weeks later Dave ran in his first and only Daytona 500 and finished 10th. Richard Petty was race winner.)

Notable finshers in the 1964 Motor Trend 500:
Marvin Panch 2nd
Fireball Roberts 3rd
Ned Jarrett 5th
David Pearson 6th
Darel Dieringer 9th
Tiny Lund 15th
Freddy Lorenzen 17th
AJ Foyt 21st
Richard Petty 26th
Paul Goldsmith 30th
Parnelli Jones 32nd
Rodger Ward 37th
Sadly, Joe Weatherly lost his life after hitting the wall on turn 6.

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[blkcoupequattro]

No Hans devices, lap belts, you drove to stay alive....

[CosmicFork]

Oh, O.K. so I was wrong about the displacement, and this Belvedere, (the famous number 43, they even made a Revel model of it) would have had the 426 wedge in it... at this time at Riverside. But that 426 wedge still must have been a really wicked engine, because would the Fords be running 427's Big Blocks at this time? Thanks for the information, (for some reason I don't understand, I find this technical stuff really interesting).

[BluesmanMark]

If you think that those cars were "stock" in 1964, let me sell you some prime oceanfront property I own here in Iowa!! LOL!!!

[BluesmanMark]

First of all, it was a 426 cubic inch Hemi, as Nascar had a 430 cubic inch limit back then, biggest it ever got. Second, the 426 Hemi didn't make it's Nascar debut until the 1964 Daytona 500, (& the qualifying races for it), after the Riverside race. For Riverside the Mopar teams still ran the 426 wedge as Chrysler was still casting Hemi blocks & didn't have enough to bring the Hemi out in Nascar then. Finally Richard was running a 63 Belvedere at Riverside, not a 64

[CosmicFork]

Richard Petty was in the lead for the first part of this race at Riverside, He had that funky Plymouth Belvedere number 43, with that wicked 451 cu in Hemi Engine in it.... He lapped the other cars at The Daytona 500 and won that race... He was able to lap the field so bad that NASCAR banned the Hemi in 65... I don't know what he did then... maybe sat out the season ?? Anybody know?

[CMoLov69]

Its good to see NASCARs roots. Old school cars. All steel, all stock. Pole was set at 102 mph. Joe Weatherly died at this race. Seat belts went mandatory in 1964 bench seat lap belts. No bucket sets then or 4 point nothing. If we went back to 1964 and got a racer. And put him in a NASCAR cup car of today he would be unstopable. Lighter, Faster, Safer. And the pay offs not to bad either.