1981 Mason-Dixon 500
| Race details | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Race 12 of 31 in the 1981 NASCAR Winston Cup Series season | |||
Layout of Dover International Speedway
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| Date | May 17, 1981 | ||
| Official name | Mason-Dixon 500 | ||
| Location | Dover Downs International Speedway, Dover, Delaware. | ||
| Course | Permanent racing facility 1.000 mi (1.609 km) |
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| Distance | 500 laps, 500.0 mi (804.6 km) | ||
| Weather | Temperatures reaching up to 69.1 °F (20.6 °C); wind speeds up to 8 miles per hour (13 km/h) | ||
| Average speed | 116.595 miles per hour (187.641 km/h) | ||
| Attendance | 40,000 | ||
| Pole position | |||
| Driver | Kennie Childers | ||
| Most laps led | |||
| Driver | Neil Bonnett | Wood Brothers Racing | |
| Laps | 404 | ||
| Winner | |||
| No. 90 | Jody Ridley | Donlavey Racing | |
| Television in the United States | |||
| Network | Mizlou | ||
| Announcers | Mike Joy | ||
The 1981 Mason-Dixon 500 was a NASCAR Winston Cup Series racing event that took place on May 17, 1981, at Dover Downs International Speedway (now Dover International Speedway) in the American city of Dover, Delaware.
During the preceding season, NASCAR had completely stopped tracking the year model of all the vehicles and most teams did not take stock cars to the track under their own power anymore. Only manual transmission vehicles were allowed to participate in this race; a policy that NASCAR has retained to the present day.
Dover Downs International Speedway, now called Dover International Speedway, is one of five short tracks to hold NASCAR races; the others are Bristol Motor Speedway, Richmond International Raceway, Martinsville Speedway, and Phoenix International Raceway. The NASCAR race makes use of the track's standard configuration, a four-turn short track oval that is 1 mile (1.6 km) long. The track's turns are banked at twenty-four degrees, and both the front stretch (the location of the finish line) and the backstretch are banked at nine degrees.
Five hundred laps took place on a paved track spanning a distance of 1.000 mile or 1.609 kilometres per lap. It took four hours and seventeen minutes for Jody Ridley to defeat Bobby Allison by 22 seconds in front of 40,000 live spectators. However, this victory was controversial because Allison's team blamed a scoring error for his loss (even though Allison himself did not actually protest the win).
The winner would win $22,560 in prize money ($59,430.57 when adjusted for inflation) while the last place winner would take home only $5,980 ($15,753.32 when adjusted for inflation). Two cautions were given out for 24 laps and the average racing speed was 116.925 miles per hour (188.173 km/h).David Pearson would acquire the pole position with a speed of 138.425 miles per hour (222.773 km/h).
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