Bay Darnell
| Bay Darnell | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Born |
February 4, 1931 Lake Bluff, Illinois |
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| Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series career | |||||||
| 3 races run over 3 years | |||||||
| First race | 1954 Willow Springs 200 (Willow Springs) | ||||||
| Last race | 1967 Atlanta 500 (Atlanta) | ||||||
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| Years active | 1962-1983 |
|---|---|
| Starts | 249 |
| Wins | 4 |
| Best finish | 2nd in 1979 |
| Previous series | |
| 1964, 1982-83 1965-1968 1981-1983 |
ARCA Series USAC Indy Car ASA National Tour |
Bay Darnell (born February 4, 1931) is an American racing driver from Lake Bluff, Illinois. He raced mainly in , but he did have a few Indy Car and NASCAR Grand National (now Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series) starts. His grandson Erik Darnell is a current NASCAR driver.
Darnell began racing Modifieds on the dirt tracks in northern Illinois and southern Wisconsin, especially Waukegan Speedway.
Darnell began racing in in 1962. He became the second driver to land in Lake Lloyd at the Daytona International Speedway during a rare appearance in an ARCA stock car. He went into the infield lake during a February 8, 1964 qualifying race for the ARCA 250.
Darnell finished third in the season points in 1973, his first time in the top three. In 1974, Darnell had his first USAC win at the Indiana State Fairgrounds after racing for 13 seasons. He led the final five laps at the one mile dirt oval. Darnell was forced to race his asphalt car after his dirt car was wrecked during the previous week's race at the Springfield Mile. Darnell drove with a broken shoulder from the earlier incident. Darnell's second USAC victory happened on the clay at the 100-mile race at DuQuoin State Fairgrounds Racetrack on August 28, 1976. His third USAC stock car win happened on June 5 in the following year at Texas World Speedway. After starting tenth, he won on the two-mile asphalt superspeedway. He took the lead on lap 148 of 250.
In the middle of the 1978 season he finished fifth at Springfield. The following week he was ruled to have jumped the final restart prematurely at DuQuoin and he was awarded a second-place finish instead of the win. In an interview with the Milwaukee Sentinel, Darnell talked about how he felt that he could win the championship that year. After having mechanical difficulties in the August 17th race at the Milwaukee Mile caused him to lose hundreds of points in the third last race of the season, he said, "If I hadn't fallen out of the Milwaukee 150, I'd be ahead (in points) right now." Darnell finished third in points that season. The following year he earned his career-best second points finish, one position better than Rusty Wallace. He dropped to third in the 1980 season points and tied his career-best second-place points finish in 1982. He earned his final USAC victory on August 15 of that year on the dirt at the Springfield Mile. He raced his final USAC race in the middle of 1983 and the series folded after running only two events in 1984.
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