1968 Fireball 300

This event lasted one hour and fifty-nine minutes over a paved oval track spanning 0.500 miles (0.805 km).^[2]

David Pearson, Bobby Isaac, Richard Petty, James Hylton, Elmo Langley, Clyde Lynn, Jabe Thomas, Frog Fagan, Henley Gray, and Stan Meserve were amongst the drivers who finished in the top ten.^[2] There were six cautions for forty-five laps and the margin of victory was more than two laps.^[2] The average speed of the race was 75.167 miles per hour (120.970 km/h) per hour while the pole speed was 89.708 miles per hour (144.371 km/h) per hour. Pearson was responsible for leading almost all the laps in the race.^[2] After this race, David Pearson moved past Roberts for 8th on the all-time wins list.^[2] A crowd of 7,800 people attended this racing event that took place on May 5, 1968, at the Asheville-Weaverville Speedway in the American community of Weaverville, North Carolina.^[2] Out of twenty-eight competitors, only ten managed to finish all 300 laps of the event.^[2]

Total winnings for this racing event was $6,900 ($62,391 when adjusted for inflation). making him the dominant driver in the event.

A bumper crop of multi-car "corporate" teams participated in the race because racing expenses have started to become prohibitively expensive for individuals to burden during the late 1960s. Few of the remaining independent teams included Margo Hamm's team, Neil Castles' team and the driver-owner Gene Black; whose day on the race track came to an abrupt end on the fourth lap due to a problem with his stock car engine.^[3]

Notable crew chiefs at this race were Harry Hyde, Dale Inman, Frankie Scott, Jake Elder, and Ray Hicks.^[4]

The transition to purpose-built racecars began in the early 1960s and occurred gradually over that decade. Changes made to the sport by the late 1960s brought an end to the "strictly stock" vehicles of the 1950s.