1954 in NASCAR

The 1954 NASCAR Grand National season (now Sprint Cup Series) consisted of 37 races from February 1, 1954, and to November 1. Lee Petty, driving for Petty Enterprises, won the championship, his first of three in the series.

The 1954 season consisted of 37 events from February 7 through October 24 of the year; opening in West Palm Beach, Florida, with a Herb Thomas victory, and concluding in North Wilkesboro, NC at the North Wilkesboro Speedway with a Hershel McGriff win. While driver Herb Thomas captured the opening event in a Hudson, the year was witness to the increased power of GM, Ford and Chrysler as Hudson slipped in its domination of the sport from previous years. Lee Petty came back to win the second race of the year at Daytona Beach, Florida, in his Chrysler. Petty completed the season with 32 top 10 finishes of the 34 events that he competed in. Through 1953, and up until the Southern 500 in 1954, Petty strung together a streak of 56 consecutive races where he was still running at the end of the race.

While Petty won fewer races (7) than Herb Thomas (12), his consistency in finishing in the top 10 a total of 7 times more often than Thomas proved to be the deciding factor in winning the championship with a 283-point margin. Rising star Buck Baker captured the winners purse a total of 4 times in 1954, and finished third after a 12th-place effort in 1953. Although several of the top stars of the sport had disagreements, and even walked away from NASCAR for a time, the sport showed itself to be larger than any of the individual stars. When Tim Flock was disqualified at Daytona, he quit the sport for a time. Fonty Flock, Al Keller and Hershel McGriff also resigned at various times throughout the year. 1954 saw drivers Petty, Thomas, Baker, Dick Rathman, McGriff, Keller, Jim Paschal, Curtis Turner, Gober Sosbee, John Soares, and Dan Letner all capture at least one victory during the year.

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