At the Finish Line

Bobby Hamilton

By Glen Grissom
Photos courtesy BobbyHamiltonRacing.com

Former Cup racer and 2004 Truck champ Bobby Hamilton, 49, lost his battle with cancer on January 7. I followed and reported on Bobby Hamilton as a writer covering NASCAR’s divisions from the ‘90s to now.

Hamilton hoists the 2004 Craftsman Truck Series championship trophy.

Hamilton was as tough a racer as you can imagine, but clean – no cheap shots. He was no BS – drive it like you stole it and give as good as you got. Fiercely independent and unafraid to speak his mind – I can’t print all of what he said once when I asked him to comment for publication about the possibility of traction control being used in Cup racing -- but it distilled to he was ready to use it if it was being used against him.

He was a racer, and didn’t forget where he came from – the short tracks where he honed his skills. He was a good as they get on a short track, yet his last Cup win was at Talladega in 2001, and the first win for team owner Andy Petree. He raced and won a championship in the Truck series. His racing there was initially perceived as a “come-down” from his years at the Cup level, but he helped give that series credibility series by his presence and take-no-prisoners driving style – and it is about the only NASCAR series that he could be himself in today’s manicured NASCAR-land.

Proud grandfather Bobby Hamilton sharing the 2004 championship spotlight with his Truck racing son, Bobby Hamilton, Jr. (R) and Hamilton Jr.'s wife Stephanie and their daughter Hailey, who was born only a few months before.
Typically, he ended up buying his own Truck team, making it competitive, and basing it in Tennessee (against the grain again). Hamilton could be as hard as nails on track, and he didn’t suffer stupid interview questions (don’t make me tell you how I know this), but he loved his sport and helped many in it. He was respected, had earned it, and did it his way.

I was at the two Phoenix Cup races that were pivotal times in his career. The first was in November 1989 when he caught a break (via a good word from Darrell Waltrip) and was tapped to drive one of the camera cars for the NASCAR-fantasy movie Days of Thunder. That was his first Cup “start.”

The camera cars were really just on track to get film footage and specifically instructed not get in the way of the regular full-time points Cup racers and stay at the back of the field. Hamilton didn’t quite see his function the same way as NASCAR did (wouldn’t be the last time, either) – he qualified the camera car 5th (!), kept mixing it up with the points racers and eventually took his Hendrick Motorsports-built car to the front to lead five laps. You can rest assured that wasn’t in the NASCAR script that day -- let alone doing it with a car that was outfitted with extra camera gear. But Bobby had capitalized on this “luck” and got noticed -- and then raced 11 full seasons of Cup.

The second time at Phoenix was in October 1996 when he won the Dura Lube 500 in the Petty Enterprises #43. It was his first Cup victory, and the first for crew chief Robbie Loomis, and the first for the Petty Enterprises #43 since Richard Petty’s last win in 1984. The only Victory Lane celebration I can think of that had that much emotion from fellow competitors was when Dale Earnhardt finally won the Daytona 500. Hamilton and the Petty crew and Richard Petty and the assembled in Victory Lane could have floated away – they were all so “up” from that win.

Hamilton was a throwback in this era of media – he wasn’t made for TV and entertainment. He was made to race. A lot of us are going to miss that. 

 

Here's What's New!