1979 FIA Cup Championship
In 1979, Richard Petty and Darrell Waltrip fought tooth and nail for the championship, with Richard Petty clinching it at the last race of the season in the Los Angeles Times 500 at the old 2.5 mile oval in Ontario, CA. Petty finished P5, and DW P8 and Petty won his 7th Winston Cup by a mere 11 points.
DW had the most wins with 7 (Petty had 5) and Petty had the most top 5's (23) and Top 10's (27).
Now on to the FIA points standings:
Code:
001 Richard Petty..........405
002 Darrell Waltrip........372
003 Bobby Allison..........346
004 Cale Yarborough........318
005 Benny Parsons..........251
006 Buddy Baker............216
007 Dale Earnhardt.........177
008 Joe Millikan...........129
009 Donnie Allison.........111
t10 Neil Bonnett...........099
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t10 Ricky Rudd.............099
012 David Pearson..........079
013 Terry Labonte..........075
014 Richard Childress......054
015 Dave Marcis............040
40 drivers scored at least one point this year. Rookies Dale Earnhardt and Terry Labonte make the list with pretty solid years. Richard Petty hangs on to win by 33 points over DW, and Neil Bonnett goes to the season ending banquet by winning the tie-breaker with Ricky Rudd by winning 3 races to Rudd's 0. Only 9 drivers scored at least 100 points, tied for lowest number with 1998. The King avg'd 13.1 ppr and the groups avg was 6.9, a drop from previous years. The group started 26.9 races out of the 31 this year. The groups avg start was a 2nd best 8.9, and their avg finish was a record 12.7.
Reliability numbers continue to climb, with the group average RAF up to 20.1 of the 31 races or 74.5 %. They avg'd 6.9 DNFs. The group avg'd finishing on the lead lap 5.8 of 31 races, or a lead lap pct of 21.53 %.
All 31 race wins were in the top 15, with 30 of those going to the top 10 drivers (David Pearson won the Southern 500 that year).
The Bud Pole Award winner is Buddy Baker with 7 poles.
:beer: :beer: Congrats to Richard Petty, the 1979 Winston Cup, and FIA Cup Champion!
