The story of how Roger Penske rose from rags to riches is one that motivational speakers across the world use to inspire their audiences. A crucial part of the tale is the time that he spent as a young driver aspiring to make it big in motorsports. He wasn’t behind the wheel for very long, only racing between 1958 and 1964, but did he win a NASCAR race when he was?
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Penske began participating in races organized by the Sports Car Club of America in 1958 and won the SCCA National D Modified championship in 1961. He won the USAC championship in 1962 and was named the Driver of the Year by the New York Times. It was on May 19, 1963, that one of the most memorable of his 52 career wins came at the Riverside International Raceway.
The 1963 Riverside 250 was a Pacific Coast Late Model Series race sanctioned by NASCAR. The series now goes by the name of the Camping World West Series. So in a way, he did win a race in a NASCAR-sanctioned race.
The opportunity to race in it came after NFL star and Riverside President Les Richter was impressed with his performance in the Yankee 300 stock car race in Indianapolis. It had been his first time driving a stock car.
Penske started the Riverside 250 from 12th place driving a No. 2 Pontiac Catalina owned by Ray Nichels. He made contact with the iconic Darel Dieringer right in the first lap and spun out. This left him in last place, but he was in no mood to give up that day. He told the Times after the race, “I just waited on that hill ‘til everyone had gone by before I tried to get back into the race.”
Once he got back into it, it was an all-out battle against Dieringer. He’d led 22 laps when the checkered flag flew and was ahead of his foe by a second. The rest of the field, which included the infamous Ken Miles, was more than 30 seconds behind. This interesting foray was his first and last into the world of NASCAR as a driver. He made sure that he left a strong mark on it.
The Pontiac that he drove was displayed during his Hall of Honor exhibit in 2019. Penske decided to quit racing in 1965 to instead focus on building a career in team ownership. He bought into a Chevrolet dealership in Philadelphia and kickstarted a journey that would become a legend.
