DARLINGTON, S.C. -- He didn't need a helmet, didn't need a firesuit. He climbed into the vehicle headfirst wearing jeans and a work shirt, his five pieces of Wrigley's spearmint gum -- one for each 100 miles -- taped to the dashboard, waiting for him. He strapped in, gunned the old Mercury to life, and headed for the exit of pit road. He was supposed to wait, and fall in line behind a pace truck and a show car being driven by Carl Edwards. But David Pearson, as his 105 career Cup victories would attest, waits for no one.

“

If I would have been with Wood Brothers the whole time I was racing, there ain't no telling how much I'd have won.

”

DAVID PEARSON

And with that, the NASCAR legend took to Darlington Raceway in a restored version of his trademark No. 21 Wood Brothers car, a vehicle that hasn't sniffed a racetrack in 35 years. Everything was in place -- the chewing gum, the cigarette lighter, the gold numbers, everything but the original seat, which is in a museum. That's where the car had been, too, until racetrack officials sent it to Leonard Wood, who got it running again so his former champion driver could take a few laps around the place where he won 10 times.

"It's a very rewarding moment to remember what this car had always done," Wood said, "and to see it come off the corner, it still looks the same way. I thought it looked racier than the cars now, but I may be prejudiced."

Pearson's just as racy, too. He and Edwards made five exhibition laps around the old egg-shaped track Wednesday, the younger driver in a No. 99 show car, the elder one in his restored classic. They traded positions, ran side by side, got up to about 100 mph. They didn't realize it was the final lap until they came out of Turn 4 the final time, with Edwards in front, and saw a checkered flag waving from the flag stand. Had Pearson known, he would have tried to beat him to the finish.

"I didn't know we were going to quit," said the 73-year-old former three-time champion, looking fit as ever with a suntan and his silver hair. "If he'd said one lap to go, I would have passed him."

That's vintage Pearson, that confidence bordering on arrogance, an unshakable belief in his own ability that helped him win more NASCAR races than anyone else but Richard Petty. After running events at Charlotte and Michigan in 1986, he retired -- his back was giving him too much trouble. "I went two years before I ever told anybody I retired," he said. "It was hard to do, it really was." Without the back trouble, he might have had a few more years ahead of him. In his last race, competing against drivers like Dale Earnhardt and Bill Elliott and Rusty Wallace, he finished 10th.

Even now, in his eighth decade, he thinks he could still compete. He's not alone. "Oh yeah," Wood said. "I hear this all the time about how Pearson would do in this day and time. Pearson is a very competitive racecar driver. I think he could still get the job done. In fact, I think he believes he can still outrun them."

"I don't see why I couldn't," Pearson added.

After Neil Bonnett was injured in a race at Dover in 1990, the Woods needed someone to shake down a car at a test in Charlotte. They called on Pearson. "He was as fast as anybody there," team co-owner Eddie Wood said. "We actually talked about him coming back and racing. There was talk about it. [Charlotte track president] Humpy [Wheeler] was in on it somehow. Enough said."

David Pearson

Career Statistics

Years	27
Starts	574
Wins	105
Top-5	301
Top-10	366
Poles	113
Laps Led	25,419
Avg. Start	6.2
Avg. Finish	11.0
Championships	3 ('66, '68, '69)

• Career Statistics

But Pearson, who lives a quiet life in his native Spartanburg, S.C., has no regrets. He won $2.4 million behind the wheel, and he took care of it. "I can't complain one bit," he said. "I'm happy with what I've done. I didn't make as much money as [today's drivers], but what I got, I actually made it from racing. It got me started, anyway. What little bit I made, I felt like I invested it good and done good. Anytime that I would win a race or something, win a little bit of money, I would go buy a building or something and rent it. I've actually made more money in real estate than racing."

He might have won even more had he raced the majority of the schedule more often. Pearson's three titles -- in 1966, '68, and '69 -- came in years where he competed in all but a few Cup events. Most years, he ran 22 or fewer. The Wood Brothers made most of their own parts and had only so many employees, so they couldn't run the full schedule every year. But when they ran, they were good. In 1973, Pearson won 11 of 18 starts in the same car he took for a spin Wednesday. During the peak of his career, from 1964-76, he won 25 percent of all the races he entered.

How many more race victories and championships might he have won had he competed every week? "There ain't no telling. There really ain't," Pearson said. "If I would have been with Wood Brothers the whole time I was racing, there ain't no telling how much I'd have won."

He says he misses the people more than the competition, but he clearly relished a chance like Wednesday to get back out on the track. He was so excited about running against Edwards that he asked his old crew chief to find an advantage. "I was talking to Leonard and I said, 'Leonard, can you cheat a little bit on it, put soft tires or something on it so we can run pretty good?' Especially when I found out he was going to have the show car here," Pearson said. "I said, 'I believe I can run as fast as he can if you cheat on it a little bit.' But I found out it's still got the same tires as on it back when I run here. They're 30 years old and a little rotten."

Almost everything on the car was the same, including the engine, a "semi Hemi" used until 1971. The vehicle had been sitting in Darlington's museum until track officials got the idea to have Leonard Wood try to get it running again. In the team's original shop in Stuart, Va., he oiled the cylinders, pumped out the oil, rebuilt the carburetor, replaced the battery and the plugs. "It fired up just immediately," he said. The only hitch was foam in the fuel cell that had deteriorated and clogged up the lines. He fixed that, and the vehicle gave a throaty, satisfying growl when Pearson fired it up Wednesday.

The result? "Smooth," Pearson said afterward. No detail had been overlooked. There was the cigarette lighter -- the knob of which was occasionally pilfered by visitors to the Darlington museum -- that Pearson used to punch every time there was a caution. One time at Darlington, he was running side-by-side with Buddy Baker, who knew he was in trouble when he looked over and saw the Silver Fox coolly lighting a cigarette as the cars barreled out of the old Turn 4. Pearson had that effect on people. He'd often pace himself during a race, Leonard Wood said, turning up the speed only in the late stages and sending his competitors into a panic.

There were his blue goggles, hanging from the rearview mirror There were the five pieces of Wrigley's spearmint -- and only Wrigley's spearmint -- taped within easy reach. "Wrigley's spearmint was the only kind that would work," Pearson said. "It would be so hot, all the rest of them would crumble up in your mouth. Wrigley's was the only one that would stick together."

There he was on the racetrack, using the same line he always did. Edwards followed in Pearson's wake, trying to pick up pointers. He even flew Pearson to Darlington in his personal airplane. "We've only been together a couple of hours," Edwards said, "and I've already learned some good tricks."

The bright white body of Pearson's Mercury stood out starkly against the deep blackness of the recently repaved Darlington surface. He wanted to go faster, but wisely didn't push it on tires that were more than 30 years old. Maybe that was for the best. Because nothing could compete with the legend Pearson created as a driver, and the confidence he still exudes to this day.

"I guarantee you," Leonard Wood said, "that he honestly believes that he can take a car and circle this track and qualify well."