NASCAR History: Car Number 46 and Speedy Thompson

by JamesJ, Special To NASCAR commentary and driver pictures, 2011 NASCAR schedule, video, Bench Racing With Steve and Charlie

Sundays of my youth consisted of NASCAR racing and cold bottles of Mountain Dew. Thirty years later not much has changed for me. However, nearly everything has changed in NASCAR.

December 30, 2009 2:00 pm UTC 2 Comments

Over the next several weeks we’ll be featuring car numbers in NASCAR history. We started with #50 and are working our way down the line. With each car number we’ll take a brief look at a couple stats related to the featured car number, but we’ll primarily spotlight either a driver, sponsor, car owner, manufacturer or other significant subject closely tied to the car number of the day.

Speedy Thompson's car number 46 We’re just a couple days away from the new year and I plan to have a little fun with today’s car number 46. You see, according to the I.N.C.H (Institute for Naming Children Humanely), “A child’s name is the most important label he or she will ever receive. It will stay with the child throughout their whole lives. Parents who choose names poorly create misleading labels for their children. These labels can cause their children to be mocked, stereotyped, or ostracized. Mocked, stereotyped, and ostracized children grow to become demented adults.”

Stats for cars running the #46:

Number of Races: 349
Number of Wins: 11
Number of Top 5s: 58
Number of Top 10s: 98
Number of Poles: 14
Number of Drivers: 45

Check out current NASCAR race statistics here at On Pit Row!

Spotlight Subject: Driver Speedy Thompson

I’ll bet that after you read the quote above from I.N.C.H. you thought for sure this post was going to spotlight Dick Trickle. The “institute” does have some amusing classifications and examples as to what makes a bad name. No doubt there are some other eyebrow raising names in NASCAR that fall into their classifications, such as: Lake Speed, Coo Coo Marlin*, Humpy Wheeler*, Boris Said, Buckshot Jones*, Red Farmer*, Harry Gant, Greg Sacks, and I just have to include Champ Car racer, Will Power in the list. Thankfully, those listed above with an “*” after their name are like Speedy Thompson, nicknames. Had his parents actually named him Speedy though, I don’t think anyone would have thought it was misleading considering his NASCAR career.

Speedy’s career started in 1950 and he wasted no time putting up results. He notched up 20 total career wins (8 of which came in the #46), 78 top fives and 106 top tens. He finished the season standings at 3rd place for four consecutive years (1956-1959). However, each year was with different car owners. In 1958 he was fielding his own car, and in 1959 he was driving for numerous owners throughout the season.

An interesting thing occurred when Speedy Thompson took the checkers at in 1956 at Hickory. That same day in California, Marvin Panch takes the checkers at Lancaster. Thompson’s win is recorded as a win in 1956, but Panch’s win is recorded as the opener of the 1957 NASCAR Grand National season. Imagine if the NASCAR of today tried to have two Sprint Cup races on opposite ends of the country on the same day. It’s just another example of how far the series has came.

When the sport lost Alfred “Speedy” Thompson it do so in a tragic way, on the track during a race. After running only three races in 1962 he left the Cup series and instead chose to focus on late model races on the local short tracks around North Carolina. Ten years later at a Charlotte track on April 2, 1972 he started his last late model race. Even though he reported not feeling well, he went ahead and participated in the race during which it is supposed that he suffered a heart attack causing him to crash and break his neck. The following day would have been his 46th birthday.

Seeing as I don’t want to have a depressing finish to this post, I’ll offer up this statement that I found while researching amusing names in NASCAR. I have no idea if it’s true, but either way it’s amusing and gives the “institute” something to point to and say, “See, we told you.” : “The funniest thing I’ve seen was Dick Trickle doing pit reporting on Ricky Craven…and the announcer goes “Whats wrong with Craven, Dick?” If it’s true, it’s most likely a case of a true story getting twisted on the internet. Most likely Dick Bergren was interviewing Ricky Craven, not Dick Trickle. Still, it’s funny.

For more on Speedy Thompson, check out his driver profile on LegendsOfNascar.com. There you’ll find more images and information about him.

Filed under: James Jones, NASCAR, NASCAR History

Tagged with: Alfred "Speedy" Thompson

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Comments

2 Responses to “NASCAR History: Car Number 46 and Speedy Thompson”

NASCAR History: Car Number 46 and Speedy Thompson : NASCAR … « Run your car with Water on January 30th, 2010 6:45 am

[...] Today found this great post, here is a quick excerpt : Over the next several weeks we’ll be featuring car numbers in NASCAR history. We started with #50 and are working our way down the line. With each car number we’ll take a brief look at a couple stats related to the featured car number, … Read the rest of this great post Here [...]
Sloan on September 8th, 2011 2:13 pm

I heard the “what’s wrong with Craven Dick” comment. It was Darrell Waltrip to Dick Bergan and it was hilarious. Cravven had just blown an engine and Darrell was calling down for reporting.

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