Gary Nelson (NASCAR)

Gary Nelson is a high-level NASCAR technical inspector. He was Bobby Allison's crew chief for his 1983 NASCAR Winston Cup championship. He was inducted in the in 2006.

Nelson was born in Elgin, Illinois on June 5, 1953, the sixth child and second son of Mildred Ollendorf and Arnold Nelson. Arnold moved his family to Redlands, California one year later to get out of the cold. Nelson left school after completing the 9th grade.

Nelson started in the racing business at 16 years old, cleaning up the shop for San Bernardino, California driver Ivan Baldwin. Nelson soon became Baldwin's number one asset as crew chief, engine builder and all around mechanic. Ivan Baldwin driving with Gary Nelson as crew chief became the top team for short track racing on the west coast. Baldwin and Nelson raced any time anywhere and seemed to win or crash on a regular basis from 1969 thru 1976. The pair raced NASCAR stock cars winning numerous track championships on the west coast. In 1976 Nelson took a floor sweeper job at DiGard Racing in the South East with young Darrell Waltrip, driving. The team won Waltrip's first big track race at Darlington in 1977. Nelson moved through the ranks to become DiGard's Chief Mechanic in 1978 as the team won at most NASCAR tracks from 1977 - 1979. Finishing 2nd to Richard Petty in the 1979 Winston Cup Championship. Nelson took a one-year break to help a friend start a new business, Ron Eaton, of Lakewood Washington.

Returning to DiGard late in 1981 Nelson became Crew Chief for DiGard's newest driver Bobby Allison. Allison had been driving for 21 years at the time and raced for 21 different owners with no championships. The combination of Nelson and Allison proved to be strong, winning their first race, the 1982 Daytona 500. Together they won 9 Winston Cup races in 1982 finishing second in points to Darrell Waltrip, who had moved to Junior Johnson's race team. Nelson and Allison came back in 1993 even stronger, winning 7 Winston Cup events and the 1983 Winston Cup Championship with Waltrip finishing 2nd. Things began to unravel between Allison and the team owners of DiGard in 1984 and 1985. Frustrated with the internal battle between Allison and DiGard Nelson built a R&D car and took it to Daytona in July 1985 to prove his ideas. Greg Sacks was offered a one race ride to drive the car. The team won what many call the biggest upset in NASCAR history by winning the 400 mile event. Instead of ending the Allison, DiGard dispute as Nelson had hoped, the Sacks victory caused even more internal conflict. When Rick Hendrick called asking Nelson to help start a second team for Hendrick Motorsports Nelson decided to take Rick up on his offer. Nelson was paired with Geoff Bodine and charged with building a complete Winston Cup race team in less than 4 months. The new team's first race together brought another win for Nelson, the 1986 Daytona 500. The team went on to win one more race in 1986 at Dover. Hendrick Motorsports began to struggle with many engine failures and crashes making 1987 a difficult year for all involved.

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