1984 Firecracker 400

The "Start your engines" command was given by President Ronald Reagan from the phone on Air Force One, which later landed at Daytona Beach International Airport. President Reagan then was escorted to one of the main press boxes at the speedway where he was met by a number of reporters, one of them being Ned Jarrett, who offered him to do some play-by-play commentary on MRN.[3]

Of forty-two drivers on the grid, forty-one were born in the United States of America while Canadian Trevor Boys was the event's lone non-American entrant.[2]

There were three cautions for fifteen laps and the race ended under caution.[2] Dean Roper would make his final NASCAR Winston Cup Series start in this event. Dale Earnhardt would take over the championship lead from Darrell Waltrip at the end of the race.[5]

An audience of 80,000 people attended the race.[2]

Richard Petty indisputably had the best car in that race until his camshaft broke (which also happened to the DiGard car driven by Bobby Allison, which also had a Robert Yates engine in it). In that race, Petty drove from 34th into the lead in just 50 laps without hardly any help from the caution flag, and by lap 60, Richard was breaking away from the field when the caution flew for Bobby Hillin's blown engine. And then after a series of pit stops dropped him back, Richard passed Cale handily, which virtually no other car on the track at that point in the race could do, and was leading when his camshaft broke on the 93rd lap.[2] Cale could have passed Richard any time he wanted to, but he wanted to stay in second and draft by on the final lap, just as he had done to win the previous two Daytona 500 races.[2]

Notable entrants in the race included Geoff Bodine, Ricky Rudd, David Pearson, Dale Jarrett (his first start on a superspeedway), Rusty Wallace, Kyle Petty, Buddy Baker, Sterling Marlin, Tim Richmond, and Darrell Waltrip.

A fight between Pearson and Richmond broke out in the garage after the race. Pearson managed to punch Richmond below the left eye before crew members of both teams and NASCAR officials broke the fight. While it was unclear what triggered the fight, it was reported that Pearson's car leaked oil on the track after blowing a head gasket and Richmond made an obscene gesture at him.[6]

At 3:00 p.m., President Reagan joined Petty and other drivers for a Kentucky Fried Chicken and Pepsi picnic. During the picnic, country singer Tammy Wynette stood arm-in-arm with the President on stage while singing "Stand by Your Man".[7][6]

Rumors later circulated that Petty's engine in the race was illegal, a controversy revived during Speedweeks 1995 when Autoweek magazine published a story alleging certain levels of favoritism by NASCAR officials over the years. The engine was built by DiGard Racing as part of a lease deal with Curb Motorsports, and on race morning there had been a dispute between the two teams over the lateness of payments; Richard Petty himself offered to cover whatever payments had been missed. Though rumors about the legality of the engine had circulated, especially in the ensuing year's Firecracker 400 when another DiGard engine was claimed to be oversized, though the claims were later denied by NASCAR, the consensus of evidence is that the engine was legal. In both cases, future NASCAR Hall of Fame inductee Robert Yates (Class of 2018) was the engine builder for DiGard.[7]

Also, because of the 1971 Myers Brothers 250, there is a dispute whether this is Petty's 200th or 201st win. The 1971 race at Bowman Gray Stadium in Winston-Salem, North Carolina was a combination race with Grand American and Grand National cars, Petty had finished second in a Grand National car to a Grand American car (Bobby Allison, driving a Mustang) that won the race; under current NASCAR rules for combination races, and in motorsport for races involving multiple divisions of cars racing at the same time, both division winners would be credited a win for their division. No win was credited in the Grand National division, and if guidelines for combination races were used then, Petty would be credited with a win.[7]

Conspiracy theories

Rival driver Cale Yarborough's premature retirement to the pit road has prompted conspiracy theorists to allege that organizers fixed the race in order to receive good publicity for the event.[8]

• An Oral History of the '84 Firecracker 400 by NASCAR.com