1956 Southern 500
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34°17′50.5″N 79°54′18.4″W / 34.297361°N 79.905111°W
| Race details[1][2] | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Race 44 of 56 in the 1956 NASCAR Grand National Series season | |||
 1956 Southern 500 program cover | |||
| Date | September 3, 1956 | ||
| Location | Darlington Raceway, Darlington, South Carolina | ||
| Course | Permanent racing facility | ||
| Course length | 1.375 miles (2.221 km) | ||
| Distance | 400 laps, 500 mi (800 km) | ||
| Weather | Very hot with temperatures of 89.1 °F (31.7 °C); wind speed of 13 miles per hour (21 km/h) | ||
| Average speed | 95.167 mph (153.156 km/h) | ||
| Attendance | 70,000[3] | ||
| Pole position | |||
| Driver | Carl Kiekhaefer | ||
| Most laps led | |||
| Driver | Curtis Turner | Charlie Schwam | |
| Laps | 225 | ||
| Winner | |||
| No. 99 | Curtis Turner | Charlie Schwam | |
| Television in the United States | |||
| Network | WJMX (local AM radio) | ||
| Announcers | Local radio announcers | ||
The 1956 Southern 500, the seventh running of the event, was a NASCAR Grand National Series event that was held on September 3, 1956, at Darlington Raceway in Darlington, South Carolina.
This race was considered to be the "Labor Day Classic" for 1956; complete with a pre-race beauty pageant with a judging panel led by Fonty Flock for the title of Ms. Southern 500 (won by 19 year old Robin Williamson of South Carolina[4]) and a parade down the front stretch of the race track.
Darlington Raceway, nicknamed by many NASCAR fans and drivers as "The Lady in Black" or "The Track Too Tough to Tame" and advertised as a "NASCAR Tradition", is a race track built for NASCAR racing located near Darlington, South Carolina. It is of a unique, somewhat egg-shaped design, an oval with the ends of very different configurations, a condition which supposedly arose from the proximity of one end of the track to a minnow pond the owner refused to relocate. This situation makes it very challenging for the crews to set up their cars' handling in a way that will be effective at both ends.
The track is a four-turn 1.366 miles (2.198 km) oval.[5] The track's first two turns are banked at twenty-five degrees, while the final two turns are banked two degrees lower at twenty-three degrees.[5] The front stretch (the location of the finish line) and the back stretch is banked at six degrees.[5] Darlington Raceway can seat up to 60,000 people.[5]
Darlington has something of a legendary quality among drivers and older fans; this is probably due to its long track length relative to other NASCAR speedways of its era and hence the first venue where many of them became cognizant of the truly high speeds that stock cars could achieve on a long track. The track allegedly earned the moniker The Lady in Black because the night before the race the track maintenance crew would cover the entire track with fresh asphalt sealant, in the early years of the speedway, thus making the racing surface dark black. Darlington is also known as "The Track Too Tough to Tame" because drivers can run lap after lap without a problem and then bounce off of the wall the following lap. Racers will frequently explain that they have to race the racetrack, not their competition. Drivers hitting the wall are considered to have received their "Darlington Stripe" thanks to the missing paint on the right side of the car.