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"Hockey has nothing on NASCAR when it comes to fights breaking out"
Donnie Allison possibly is most remembered for his involvement in a final-lap crash and a subsequent fist-fight with Cale Yarborough in the 1979 Daytona 500. He was leading the race on the final lap with Yarborough drafting him tightly. As Yarborough attempted his signature slingshot pass at the end of the backstretch, Allison attempted to block him but Yarborough refused to give ground. As he pulled alongside Allison, his left side tires left the pavement and went into the wet and muddy infield grass. As a result, Yarborough's car started losing control and contacted Allison's halfway down the backstretch. As both drivers tried to regain control, their cars made contact several times and finally locked together and crashed into the outside wall in turn 3. After the cars settled in the grass, Allison and Yarborough started to argue. After they had talked it out, Bobby Allison, who was lapped at that point, pulled over and began to defend his brother, but a fist-fight broke out. It all happened on the first nationally televised NASCAR race. Richard Petty, who was over half a lap behind at the time of the crash, went on to win the race. The fight made headlines all across America. The publicity was instrumental in the growth of NASCAR.
"Licensing this particular car was a real coup", says Salvino whose new model company is starting to heat up the modeling world. What car was more iconic to the growing success and popularity of NASCAR? Not only did we have the famous fight in the first televised race, but the Hawaiian Tropics Car went on to become a movie success in the 1981 movie "Cannonball Run" featuring the late beloved actor Burt Reynolds as the driver.
Salvino's JR Models is a brand new model company dedicated to manufacturing the most fully detailed and authentic NASCAR scale model replica kits ever produced. Hailing from a family with deep racing heritage, Rick Salvino has launched into his new model kit project with great gusto. Rick indicates to us that he is starting with General Motors licensing to fill in some gaps of stock cars that have never been produced as plastic model kits. He hopes to produce 3-4 new kits a year with a few very low production run special issues. Delays are possible and almost probable. This is their second kit and they are giving us November as the estimated availability.
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