NASCAR's Most Random Manufacturer: Buick

ask anyone of any time period what their favorite make of car is and I bet you that no matter who you ask or how far back in time you go you will be hard-pressed to find anyone who gives two flying feathers about General Motors most neglected brand Buick it is a brand of car stuck out in no man's land neither a luxury brand or an economy make maker of neither timeless classics or modern masterpieces my generation mostly remembers Buick as grandma's grocery getter in church shuttle they were nicest cars that were relatively affordable but other than that there's not much else to report back about them even in Buicks newest ad campaigns they seemed resigned to their role as the forgettable family paddy wagon the entire ads focus on people not even recognizing the cars as Buicks hey check out my new Buick oh this is a Buick huh never would have guessed such as Buicks lot in life now but for a brief moment in history they did have their time in the Sun and then immediately vanished right thereafter so let's take a look at NASCAR's most maligned forgotten an eclectic manufacturer today Buick [Music] buicks journey in nascar begins with the very first NASCAR Cup Series race held on June 19 1949 at the old 3/4 mile dirt oval Charlotte Speedway no relation to the Charlotte Motor Speedway of today Curtis Turner and Lee petty wrapped in 1946 in a 1948 Buick respectively but only Turner managed to stay out of trouble in navitat n Lee petty crashed out past the halfway point you got about 25 bucks for his troubles the triple shields would be a fixture in nascar fields from that point forward albeit in limited numbers there weren't exactly a whole lot of them running around turning laps most races only had a couple of them being fielded in any given time and even the big tracks with 60 or even 70 cars in the running saw only a few Buicks throw their hat in the ring yeah even back then not a whole lot of people cared about Buick so how long did it take for one of these things that wind up in victory lane with seasons in the early 50s often consisting of 30 or 40 some-odd races at a time surely Buick found his way into victory circle fairly soon right do you consider the seventh season of competition soon yep we'd have to wait six years to see Buick win its first race it took 187 races to finally get the job done and it's worth noting that pretty much every single other manufacturer had wins up to this point Studebaker Nash and Hudson all had wins held the Hudson Hornet had absolutely crushed the competition in the early 50s as they were the first make to provide factory support to NASCAR but all of those makes aren't even around anymore to gloat about it he'll Jaguar even scored a win before Buick Jaguar and a one-off victory at the Linden Airport circuit in 1954 what about the big three for GM and Chrysler Ford had all three of its Mixon Victory Lane Ford's Lincoln's and Mercury's won tons of races in the early days Chrysler Corp also had wins for all of its brands Chrysler Dodge and Plymouth and even GM had wins four Chevy and Oldsmobile Pontiac hadn't won yet but that was just due to lack of trying on their part as they had only made a handful of starts and total up to this point and Cadillac was also one list but only because very few mad lads wanted to risk busting up a perfectly good caddy for shots and goggles and hundred dollar paychecks Buick tried tried and tried with all manner of drivers over the course of years and all sorts of different racetracks the beaches of Daytona that paved high banks of Darlington and every dirt track from Georgia to Maine and back but finally after 187 shots one bullet finally struck at the Charlotte Speedway where it all began and Buck Baker finally did the deed Herb Thomas sporting the only other Buick that day crashed out considering that herb Thomas has an absurd win percentage of nearly 21% across his entire career the fact that he didn't bring a home is pretty ridiculous but hey that's just Buick for you give them the best driver with the best team around him and they'll still find a way to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory speaking of Herb Thomas he got to make their second win just three months later at the 1 mile paved for Rowley Speedway oh hey I've been there man they really let that place go to hell lately anyway with two wins now one on a dirt short track and the other on a big paved Super Speedway surely the floodgates were about to open those 55 Buicks were bad fast and all manner of tracks and when number 3 was right around the corner right well we'd have to wait a while [Music] when number 3 February 1981 nearly three decades later that is the longest drought between victories of any manufacturer in NASCAR history by a mile hell it might be the longest between wins for any make in any motorsport period was Buick just staying home at this time no they were out there in the 1960s there were a lot of Buicks racing see here's some pictures of them in the 1970s there were still a lot of Buicks held Dale Earnhardt's first Daytona 500 and 1979 where he charged up to the front past AJ Foyt and Neil Bonnett and led a few laps and brought a home in eighth you might think that was a Monte Carlo but no he did that driving of Buick Regal which looks very similar to it the Regal back then was a fairly popular make and model with everyone Dale Earnhardt made three starts in a Buick that year on route to his Rookie of the Year title and during this winless streak Buick had a lot of models go out there and try to bring home the trophy whether it was the Regal a Roadmaster a century a Riviera or a Skylark nothing worked for Buick nothing was revolutionary about them or inspired any sort of brand loyalty Oldsmobiles at that time redefined what the NASCAR world thought about aerodynamics Chevy's were out there winning out of sheer tenacity and had a massive following Dodge and Plymouth dominated the 60s and 70s with the king at their helm Ford was a massive conglomerate who threw tons of money around and won through sheer crushing weight of their corporate light and Mercury was the Wood Brothers baby the trio of the Silver Fox Mercury in the wood Bros were unstoppable Buick never had anything like that no heroes no innovative trickery no aces up their sleeves they were just out there collecting paychecks but as the 80s rolled around a simple rule change in a big factory support push would change everything if there was ever a decade of Buick it was the 1980s starting in 1981 NASCAR implemented new rules to make the cars look more like their showroom counterparts I mean these things had gotten pretty far out of hand by the time the late 70s wrapped up here's where the 1980 Buick Regal and NASCAR looked like and here's what one on the street actually was supposed to look like yeah pretty dramatic difference there NASCAR was still holding on to the bigger chassis of the 1977 season so in 1981 they shortened the wheelbase to make the car look more like the compact models of the 80s gone were the land yachts of the 1970s and then came the Box body Brigade there was also a stipulation in the new rules package that stated that manufacturers had to provide the body panels for their cars so that way they would always remain stonk looking everything else was purpose-built by the team's only the outer shell was in the auto makers hands the new changes were not well received by the drivers the shorter wheelbase made the cars terribly unstable and Darrell Waltrip said of the new cars those things were evil they'd snap around on you in a heartbeat Chevy olds and Ford were not prepared for these role changes and brought in cars that had the aerodynamic properties of a thrown rock but Pontiac had gotten the drop on everyone with the lamont a car with a sloped rear cabin that brought air gently down to the rear spoiler and this look front end helped it cut through the air Buick however either by genius or dumb luck brought in the rebooted Regal which had a sloped front end and a rear cabin that didn't make the air as turbulent as its olds and Chevy cousins everyone thought that Pontiac had the 1981 Daytona 500 in the bag it was just assumed that it was a done deal but as the day went on the King charged to the front in his regal and won the day for his seventh and final Daytona 500 crown that record still stands as the most Daytona 500 to 1 by any driver ever a king driving a regal and winning a crown how fitting but Buick wasn't done oh no they'd go on to win the next 47 of 61 races as well as the 81 and 82 championships with that same Darrell Waltrip who hated the package at the beginning of the year safe to say he warmed up to it in 1983 Ford was tired of getting their asses handed to them by pretty much all of GM's brands the 81 and 82 Thunderbird had gotten the derogatory nickname boxy Burt assigned to it and Ford realized it was time for a change so they completely retooled the t-bird from the ground up they took a look at the rules and found out that they pretty much had the leeway to do whatever they damn well pleased with their new car in the 1983 Thunderbird a car so streamlined that it scared the bejesus out of its competitors and demanded a response the arrow wars were now fully underway [Music] [Applause] [Music] the Monte Carlo SS was an instant hit and started winning immediately it sloped front end and reconfigured rear cab and fixed all the problems that had plagued its 81 and 82 counterparts but admittedly they had just ripped off these features from the Regal even still the Regal would nab its third championship in a row with Bobby Allison in 1983 over Darrell Waltrip who was driving the new Monte Carlo Oldsmobile was pretty much completely the same from 1981 through 1985 but Pontiac had switched from the now underperforming LeMond to the Grand Prix which started doing slightly better the Thunderbird would undergo some minor fixes and alterations over the years through 1985 making it more and more aerodynamic with Bill Elliot's red engine number nine at the helm the birds were all but impossible to beat on the big tracks but 4-1 Chevy got the leg up on everyone and was no longer playing catch-up the 1986 Monte had a sloped bubble rear window that fixed all of its rear end waters Pontiac followed suit and pretty much straight up copy-pasted the design Oldsmobile Buick now also had to change and release the Delta 88 in the LeSabre respectively and they were awful they were ugly not particularly aerodynamic and they lost most of the big teams up to this point to Ford and Chevy they won only a handful of races before going back to the drawing board for the 88 season Ford on the other hand not to be outdone introduced the 1987 Thunderbird and completely burned the conventions of the rural set down to the ground a NASCAR t-bird in its showroom counterpart now looked nothing alike and with that NASCAR dropped some of the rules from the 88 changes and we ended up with what we had in the 90s stock cars that were not even remotely close to stock and the Aero wars were officially over [Music] by the time 1984 rolled around Buick doubled down on the recent NASCAR success and relaunched the Buick Grand National for consumers which was essentially a showroom Buick Regal with a turbocharged v6 they kept fooling around with it over the years and by 1985 was outrunning the Corvette and by the time they ran its final iteration in 1987 under the GNX or grand national experimental banner they had somehow created one of the fastest production cars in the world second only to the Lamborghini Countach that year yeah that brand of Grandma cars accidentally coughed up the second fastest production car in the world out of thin air just riding the high they had after their NASCAR Winston Cup success and this weirdness didn't even stay confined to NASCAR they started running well in the Trans Am series and even made a name for themselves in IndyCar yeah Indy car they had been in and out of IndyCar competition since the 1910s but then they just kind of dropped off in popularity during the USAC kart split in the 70s then they came back in the 80s with a nifty idea what if we just made engines that were stupid fast but wildly unstable this seems completely insane but at a time when the Indy 500 was having for year 50 guys trying to show up and qualify for a 33 car field Buick had a lot of buyers and those engines were cheap to buying a Buick power plant virtually guaranteed a starting slot and finishing dead last in the 500 paid out way more than the engines were worth and just how fast were these things well they sat 1/2 on the grid in 1985 and set a new track record so how about those reliability issues just how dodgy were these things how about this only 2 Buicks ever ran the entire 500-mile distance they were that unreliable and to put the icing on the cake and their last year of competition in 1992 Roberto Guerrero said on the pole for Buick again and then wrecked on the parade lap well that's just beautiful you and I wouldn't have it any other way in 1988 Buick dropped the LeSabre and switch back to the Regal and the 88 regal much like the 87 Thunderbird was a big departure from his street faring counterpart but it was damned fast if one in its first showing at the Daytona 500 piloted by Bobby Allison who was aging like a fine wine and picked up that iconic father-son one to finish to boot this was also the first race with the new restrictor plate which had been introduced because of Bobby Allison and his Buick LeSabre the previous here at Talladega ricky rudd would get another one for Buick at the Glen and that was it for their 88 campaign in 89 they only nabbed a single win ricky rudd again at sonoma by the time 1990 rolled around Rudd was out of the Quaker State number 26 and Brett Bodine took up driving duties and nabbed Buicks final win in the NASCAR Cup Series at North Wilkesboro Speedway maybe electronic timing and scoring hadn't been invented yet and after Bret short pitted during a long green flag run a caution came out and the pace car just kind of picked up the wrong car as the leader and everybody forgot what lap Brett Bodine was on Larry Mac was his crew chief that day and even he admits that yeah there was a lot of doubt in his mind but he was just gonna roll with it and that win still stands today hey this was only ever going to end one way for Buick weird as hell and that's just the way I like it Buick ran one final season in 1991 went winless and dipped before the 1992 season began Oldsmobile soon followed and GM was left just with Chevy and Pontiac Dodge came back Pontiac folded Oldsmobile was dead and gone Toyota joined the fray Pontiac went bankrupt dodge left again and Mercury is dead but somehow Buick still stands in the consumer market despite no presence in Motorsports or really anywhere else for that matter now obviously you might be wondering how how is this brand whose name is basically mud in the States still clinging on to life well you might be surprised that they're actually doing quite well for themselves and sell about a million new cars a year in China eighty percent of their sales come from China where Buick is seen as a high-end luxury brand the way that we might see BMW or Mercedes over here well Buick ever come back to NASCAR well I certainly hope so they keep teasing about releasing a new Grand National and then never do anything with it so we'll see but if there's any takeaway from their history it's this the only thing that's for sure about Buick is that nothing is for sure anyway I'm slap shoes thanks for watching and until next time y'all take it easy [Music] [Applause] [Music]

Channel: S1apSh0es

Views: 498,812

Rating: 4.922708 out of 5

Keywords: NASCAR, buick grand national, Buick, Regal, 1981 Daytona 500, 80's NASCAR, Buick GNX, S1apSh0es, slapshoes, S1ap Sh0es, auto maker history, NASCAR history, GNX, 1987 GNX, Richard Petty, Bobby Allison, NASCAR Heat 5, stock car, 1981 rule change, Darrell Waltrip, NASCAR Cup Series highlights, racing history, Buick Indycar

Id: c8oboJGqEjg

Length: 14min 51sec (891 seconds)

Published: Sat Jul 11 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/sriliff]

Bobby Allison’s ‘88 Buick is one of the best looking stock cars of all time

[u/chefsosjk]

I might be totally wrong here, but my recollection is that Bobby and DiGard went into 1983 fully intending to run the Monte Carlo SS full time, but had issues with getting the nose piece from Chevy (I think Junior Johnson was the distributor?) and just said fuck this, we'll run the Regal.

EDIT: I know he wrecked a couple of Montes at Daytona, and changed after that.

EDIT 2: Switched to Buick after Rockingham, race #3.

[u/sideslick1024]

S1ap is one of the few YouTubers where I will actually click that bell icon.

He has earned a spot in my phone notifications.

[u/WombatZeppelin]

We need Slap on this sub

[u/kracer20]

My first two cars were a 1978 Regal, then a 1981 Regal with T-Tops. Loved those cars. Both had the same 1969 350 small block installed in them.

[u/SkittleCar1]

Buick quasi-races in the Australian SuperCars. What they call Holden Commodore, is a Buick Regal in the US.

[u/48ever]

It’s rare that I get excited for new yt vids anymore, but when I see a new S1ap vid, I can’t click fast enough. He’s awesome.

[u/itsbotpixel]

god, s1ap is a fuckin beautician

[u/StormtheWalrus]

Learned about the GNX for this video for the first time haha. GM must've been a strange strange place in the 80's and 90's