• Richard Petty won his first Firecracker 400 in 1975, his 172nd career victory. • Richard Petty had won everything at Daytona in February, but not in the summer. • His long-awaited Firecracker 400 win came a year after David Pearson made him visibly angry.

When the NASCAR haulers rolled into Daytona Beach in the summer of 1975, Richard Petty’s future Hall of Fame plaque was already largely engraved.

He’d won five of what would become seven Cup Series championships. He'd also won five of his eventual seven Daytona 500s.

He’d even already won 171 races, almost exactly twice the amount of David Pearson, who ranked second on the list then and second after both men finished racing.

But Petty had never won Daytona’s “other race,” the Firecracker 400, forerunner to this Saturday evening’

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