{"id":432,"date":"2011-06-16T08:00:13","date_gmt":"2011-06-16T12:00:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/inspiringathletes\/?p=432"},"modified":"2013-12-09T16:40:32","modified_gmt":"2013-12-09T21:40:32","slug":"nascar-legend-richard-petty-on-being-the-king-changing-times-and-his-legacy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/inspiringathletes\/2011\/06\/nascar-legend-richard-petty-on-being-the-king-changing-times-and-his-legacy.html","title":{"rendered":"NASCAR legend Richard Petty on being “The King,” changing times, and his legacy"},"content":{"rendered":"

Walk around the garage area during any NASCAR Cup event and you\u2019ll almost surely run into the sport\u2019s most enduring (and perhaps endearing) figure. They call him \u201cThe King\u201d but he\u2019d assume you call him Richard. Whatever you call him, Richard Petty is arguably the greatest stock racer of all time with a record 200 races and seven Cup championships to his credit.<\/p>\n

A few years back, I had the rare privilege of sitting down with a true legend\u2014in his motor coach no less\u2014along with son Kyle. So for today\u2019s entry, I thought you might enjoy what he had to say about changing times, why he\u2019s still in the game and what comes to mind when he hears the word \u201clegacy.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Richard Petty signs autographs for fans at the 2011 Sprint Cup race in Kansas (Photo courtesy of NASCARmedia.com)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Bonham: What are some of the biggest differences between stock car racing during your era and what it looks like today?<\/p>\n

Petty: I drove 32 years in Cup racing. I won seven Daytona\u2019s, seven championships, 200 races and took in a little over seven million dollars. The last two or three years, the champion has won eight or nine million dollars (in one season). I drove 15 years before our team made the first million dollars.<\/p>\n

When we started, they were stock cars. Now they\u2019re racecars. But what did that was money and technology. The biggest change in the whole world has been technology. The technology has driven us and we\u2019ve driven technology. You used to have three or four guys that worked on the whole car, built the motors, took it to the racetrack, pitted and all that. Now you\u2019ve got specialists for everything. All businesses do the same thing. We\u2019re no different.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bonham: Why have you stayed so connected to the sport since retiring from racing?<\/p>\n

Petty: (Laughs) Try to make a living!<\/p>\n

Bonham: But is it also partly because you still love doing it?<\/p>\n

Petty: It\u2019s a combination. Circumstances dictate a lot of what we do. We\u2019re racing and we have an opportunity to do the Driving Experience. It fits right into our world. We\u2019re working now on the national sprint car league. That just fits right with this. We don\u2019t have to go into the car business or something that\u2019s completely different. Our little world is racing.<\/p>\n

Bonham: What do you think when people call you \u201cThe King?\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Kyle Petty introduces his father Richard Petty at the 2010 NASCAR Hall of Fame ceremony (Photo courtesy of NASCARmedia.com)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Petty: I don\u2019t pay any attention to it. My name\u2019s Richard. I\u2019ve done my thing. I tell them a lot of times, \u201cIt\u2019s better to be known as that than some of the stuff people would really like to call you.\u201d They\u2019re always calling somebody something.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bonham: What\u2019s the difference between finishing first or 43rd?<\/p>\n

Petty: You can work hard, do everything that you think is right, but one thing you\u2019ll never overcome in life is fate. You can\u2019t control fate.<\/p>\n

Bonham: Your son Kyle remains one of the most popular figures in the sport due to his work with Victory Junction Gang Camp. Where does his charitable spirit come from?<\/p>\n

Petty: He grew up around his mother. She always had something going at the church or at the school. She worked for the PTA. She was a Scout teacher. She was in 4H. He grew up in it. He was able to get out and see how lucky we were to have the advantages in life. We worked for it, but we could go and we could do and we were all healthy. So when he goes out and he sees all of these other people, he wants to give back. Like I said, he learned it from his mother.<\/p>\n

Bonham: How often do you think about the Petty legacy and what do you think that legacy represents?<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Richard Petty celebrates his first victory at Charlotte on May 25, 1975 (Photo by RacingOne\/Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Petty: I haven\u2019t really ever gone there. We\u2019re doing our thing in our time under our circumstances. Hopefully, you leave a good taste in everybody\u2019s mouth and they remember the good. If something happened to us right now and we\u2019re not here anymore, we would hope that you would forget about the racing part and go to the camp, the things that we have left that will enrich other people\u2019s lives later down the road where racing won\u2019t. Racing will be history and that\u2019s what we happened to do, but (the camp) is what we left for the rest of the world. Your legacy\u2019s not going to last very long. The big deal is that you can get something started and then that part of it goes on, that\u2019s the most important part.<\/p>\n

Bonham: So then what drives you?<\/p>\n

Petty: Its just life. I look at it as life. When you get up in the morning, (you ask), \u201cCan I do a little better than I did yesterday?\u201d That\u2019s the challenge of not just saying the same. Can we make our business a little bit better? Can we help somebody today that we didn\u2019t help yesterday? Its just life.<\/p>\n

Check back in tomorrow for an interview with Pittsburgh Pirates manager Clint Hurdle.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Walk around the garage area during any NASCAR Cup event and you\u2019ll almost surely run into the sport\u2019s most enduring (and perhaps endearing) figure. They call him \u201cThe King\u201d but he\u2019d assume you call him Richard. 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Chad\u2019s professional journey began at the University of Tulsa where he graduated with a Bachelor of Arts (1993) while working extensively in athletic media relations and serving as a sports editor for The Collegian. Since then, he has written extensively for such publications as Relevant, CCM, Christian Retailing, New Man, Charisma, Today\u2019s Christian, Ministries Today, Breakaway, Brio, Sports Spectrum, Christian Single, Faith & Friends, Sharing the Victory and Gospel Today. He has authored, co-authored or ghost written and edited 13 books including Life in the Fairway (New Leaf Press), Glory of the Games (Cross Training), Wrestling with God (River Oak), Spiritual Journeys (Relevant) and the four-part Fellowship of Christian Athletes Core Value Series; Excellence, Teamwork, Serving and Integrity (Regal Books). Chad is currently working on five new books including Sooner Legacy, Husker Legacy and Lessons From Sooner Football (Cross Training) as well as The Faith of Stock Car Racing (Judson Press). When he's not writing, Chad lends his efforts to various independent television and film projects. He was the coordinating producer for Choosing Life (2010) and Life Happens (2011). Chad is currently serving as producer on a forthcoming documentary about Super Bowl champion Brian Kinchen. Chad and his wife Amy live in Broken Arrow, Okla., with sons Lance (September 2003), Cole (February 2008) and Quinn (February 2011).","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/inspiringathletes\/author\/cbonham"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/inspiringathletes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/432","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/inspiringathletes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/inspiringathletes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/inspiringathletes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/418"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/inspiringathletes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=432"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/inspiringathletes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/432\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3375,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/inspiringathletes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/432\/revisions\/3375"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/inspiringathletes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=432"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/inspiringathletes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=432"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/inspiringathletes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=432"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}