On what it was like pulling through the tunnel into Daytona International Speedway in 1959
At that time there was no such thing as testing. We didn't see the racetrack until we got there with the racecar. As we came through the tunnel, there was nothing in the infield. I think they had one little inspection deal and that was it because we inspected the cars out on the grass. Then it rained a couple of days and we had to wade in because the cars were actually sitting in water, because that was a swamp to begin with. To a 21-year-old kid, that was nothing. I mean, the whole world was new to me, and that wasn't different than anything else. Then we went out on the racetrack and I think we ran 130 miles an hour. The fastest we ran before then was at Darlington where we ran a hundred miles an hour. The speeds were irrelevant because the track was so big. The problems that most drivers had was they had to unlearn. I didn't know anything. I had run maybe 10 or 12 races before I went to Daytona so everything was new. Everything I could learn without saying, well, at a certain track like Darlington I did this, or at Martinsville I have to drive like this. I was learning everything. So it made it easy for me. It was really good timing for me, for my career, to race Darlington and all the superspeedways. I grew up in that era. I didn't have to unlearn the stuff I had learned for 10 years or how to race. In fact, if you watch the first race, Daddy and Beauchamp were passing each other every other lap instead of one sitting down and figuring out what was going on, because that's the way they had always run. Whenever I got out their in the convertible in the 100-mile races, I said, this ain't working, guys, so let me figure out a way to race. I didn't forget about it or learn by instinct-I had to learn that. That made it so much easier from that standpoint.
On the 1976 Daytona 500 and the last-lap crash between Petty and David Pearson, who won the race
We came down to the last lap and I got caught leading the race. David was second, so you knew what he was going to do. And he did exactly what I thought he was going to do. He went down the backstretch and he pulled out to pass me. He misses his mark going into turn three, which gives me a break in that I get to hit my mark. Basically, I thought I had cleared him. The reason I pulled out in front of him was to keep him from drafting back by me. I missed it about six inches and that caused all heck. You look back and you say, OK, I would have been better off to have done it like I did with Cale in '84. We had exactly the same situation. The deal was, when I got beside of Cale, I just stayed beside of Cale. I didn't try to go ahead and go by him because I knew he could come back by me or whatever. I learned from '76 and that helped me win my 200th race in '84. It was a learning experience in that I just misfigured and wound up second in '76.
On Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s place in NASCAR and unreasonable expectations
I'm glad it's him and not me having to go through all that crap. Because what happens is that people expect so much of him, but he really handles it good. He knows that he's not on top of his game, knows he's not doing what he thinks he can do, and that's the reason for all the moves and all this stuff. Emotionally, he handles it really, really good, the popularity of it. He's still low key as far as just doing his own thing. I don't think in the long run that it's going to hurt him in any way, shape or form. I think what he's doing right now is going to put more pressure on him than he's ever had, because he's going to a new team, going to a team that ran first and second in the championship and won (18) races. So he's going to be expected by his fans and the general public to come out winning races. And if he don't, that's really going to put a lot of pressure on him, mentally. He's going to put enough pressure on himself to go out and do the job, but I think he's up to it. I think he's been through a lot of turmoil with his dad, with his stepmother, and with all the circumstances of the popularity that he has, that he'll be able to handle it, no trouble.