More than three decades have passed since Janet Guthrie drove to a 15th-place finish in the World 600 at what was then known as Charlotte Motor Speedway.

It was a public-relations coup of great magnitude that Guthrie even ended up in the race, one orchestrated by H.A. "Humpy" Wheeler, who then was just beginning what would be a long and distinguished career as president and general manager of the facility that these days is named Lowe's Motor Speedway. It would be years until Wheeler publicly spilled the story about how it all came to pass, the details of which he continues to reveal in bits even today.

"The Janet Guthrie thing was a real enigma because, No. 1, it was extremely controversial behind the scenes -- not so much in front," Wheeler said. "A lot of drivers did not like seeing her at the track because, at that time, women were alien to NASCAR. Maybe 15 percent of the crowd was female, versus the 40 percent it is today -- and virtually none of them were in the pit area.

"So having her come into what was so macho at the time, a lot of the guys didn't like it. Now on the other hand, it added tremendous spectator interest."

That, in fact, is ultimately what Wheeler was after. Guthrie was after something much, much more complex -- something she never was quite able to achieve.

Of her historic run in 1976, Guthrie said: "It was not bad for a rookie, and a hastily-assembled team."

In the wake of Danica Patrick's win in the IndyCar Series in Japan last month, the first for a woman in a major motorports event, the 32nd anniversary of Guthrie's celebrated ride in the World 600 also brings with it many questions. Why, after so many years, has NASCAR's top series failed to produce a single full-time female driver, much less one that has been able to win? And as this year's Coca-Cola 600 approaches, is NASCAR any closer to doing so?

As with many ponderous questions, the answers really are no more than best guesses. But with history as a guiding aid, best guesses oftentimes turn into tomorrow's truths.

With that in mind, a trip back to the memories forged in May of 1976 in Charlotte is in order.

“

I would much rather go take a crack at NASCAR rather than hang around Indianapolis and bask in the whatever -- because I was a racing driver right through to my bone marrow.

”

JANET GUTHRIE

Guthrie's dream was to compete in the Indianapolis 500, which she ultimately would do. But in 1976, after lining up a ride in car owner Rolla Vollstedt's Bryant Heating and Cooling Special, it became painfully obvious very quickly that her car was anything but special. In her first practice session, the car developed engine problems after she ran just seven laps.

The next day, she ran 20 laps before the engine began to come apart again. And by her fourth day at Indy, she had posted a top speed of only 168.20 mph -- when it generally was believed that it was going to take a top speed of 181 mph or more to get into the race during qualifying.

One week later, she did get her top speed up to 173.611 mph. But it wasn't enough. Despite the waves of publicity that her practice attempts were generating, Guthrie's car was pulled out of qualifications the day before the last weekend of qualifying.

In stepped the legendary A.J. Foyt, who frequently entered backup cars at Indy while driving another car himself. On the morning of the final round of time trials, after consulting with Guthrie, Foyt put her behind the wheel of such a car and watched her turn a respectable practice lap at 180.796 mph -- even though it was nearly 10 mph slower than laps routinely turned by Foyt in earlier practice sessions with the same machine.

The media buzz created by the possible Foyt-Guthrie connection was as intense as it was short-lived. Foyt decided later the same day that he was not going to allow Guthrie to try to qualify the car. Her dreams of racing in an Indy 500 would have to wait another year.

Meanwhile, Wheeler had been working his Indy sources behind the scenes all along. He wanted Guthrie to come to his track in Charlotte to compete in the World 600.

"No. 1, we were getting killed at the box office -- because the publicity she was getting at Indianapolis was just insane," Wheeler said. "I would say up until race week, there was a whole lot more in the Charlotte Observer about the Indy 500 than there was about the 600 right in their backyard, because of her news. And so we weren't selling tickets. We had 50 percent of the tickets unsold going into the weekend before the race. And that was terrible, so you know, I was just thinking the entire cause of it was her, and the awesome publicity they were getting up there.

"I had talked to her a couple of times. I don't think she liked talking to me, because I kind of represented failure -- because her goal was to make the Indy 500. And at the time, NASCAR had not overtaken IndyCar racing yet; it was on its way, but it hadn't happened. So I think she was looking at that as a lesser thing. I knew it would take something extraordinary to make it happen.

"But as I kept calling to Indy and talking to my contacts up there, it just appeared that she didn't have a car that was capable of making the race. So we just kept the pressure on."

Thirty-two years after the fact, Guthrie confirmed that she had instructed Vollstedt to field all calls from Wheeler and others pressuring her to come to Charlotte.

“

The associated free-for-all [with the media] was of no interest to me; I just wanted to be on the track.

”

JANET GUTHRIE

"I was putting my entire heart and soul into the Indianapolis effort. That came to an end on the last Sunday of qualifying -- when A.J. Foyt had let me take his backup car out in practice and I ran a lap fast enough to qualify, but he decided not to let me make a qualifying run with it," Guthrie said.

"So that was Sunday. And Sunday after qualifying closed, Rolla Vollstedt asked me whether I wanted to stay at Indianapolis or whether I would be interested in taking a crack at Charlotte -- because Rolla had been keeping his finger on the pulse of this all along. I myself didn't want to know about it. I knew an offer from Charlotte had been floating around. I didn't want to know anything about it until my chance at Indianapolis came to an end."

The conversation was brief once Vollstedt spelled out Guthrie's remaining options. She could stay in Indianapolis and continue to be little more than a media darling, or she could go to Charlotte and actually try to be in a race on the following Sunday.

"I said yes, of course. I would much rather go take a crack at NASCAR rather than hang around Indianapolis and bask in the whatever -- because I was a racing driver right through to my bone marrow," Guthrie said. "The associated free-for-all [with the media] was of no interest to me; I just wanted to be on the track."

The next morning, Guthrie and Vollstedt were on a plane to Charlotte.

Wheeler had arranged everything. He had a car lined up -- one formerly owned by Hoss Ellington that had actually been disqualified from the pole position at the Daytona 500 the previous February. He had what he called "the perfect sponsor" lined up -- the Kelly Girls, a temporary employment agency that employed mostly women but felt it needed a larger presence in a male-dominated workforce.

Wheeler actually had arranged purchase of the car for $21,000, but he didn't want anyone thinking the track was in the car-owning business or looking to show favoritism to any particular driver. So he recruited Lynda Ferreri, vice president of First Union National Bank in Charlotte, to pose as the owner of the No. 68 Kelly Girls Chevrolet.

"A female race driver? What could be better than having a female car owner, too?" Wheeler said. "I don't believe we had ever had a female car owner before, and I knew she liked racing -- and she had a big job, the biggest job in the history of Charlotte banking for a woman. So she jumped all over it. I mean, how could she not? Of course, she had to take it on at that point, and take on the responsibility of it."

But the $21,000 cashier's check that Ferreri made a show of forking over to become a Cup car owner? It wasn't her money.

"Oh, no, no, no. She didn't put that up. We had a check and everything ready for her," Wheeler said.

The next step

AP

Janet Guthrie poses with Bruton Smith just before the 1976 World 600.

The deal behind the scenes may have been controversial, but at least it smoothly placed Guthrie where she wanted to be -- on a racetrack with a legitimate shot of making a big-time race. Once she arrived in the garage, things didn't go quite as smoothly. Many of the veteran drivers were openly hostile to her.

"It definitely was a mixed bag. I described it as sort of a Gaussian [bell] curve from hostile to skeptical to a little bit of open-mindedness on one end," Guthrie said. "I think it's pretty safe to say that no one expected me to make the field. If I remember right, there were 60-some cars entered for a 40-some car field. And my car didn't even reach the racetrack until a day late, which meant everybody else had been practicing and qualifying for two or three days."

Guthrie said that not all the veteran drivers resented her presence. She said Donnie Allison "actually gave me some good advice; I was very grateful for it." And she also was loaned a car by Joe Frasson to practice in while awaiting her own chariot.

She described the 6-foot-4, 240-pound Frasson as "a good ol' boy from the north [Minnesota], but still a good ol' boy who was so mean and tough that he smoked a cigar and chewed tobacco at the same time. Joe was a good guy, though."

When it came time for qualifying, she was ready. So was Wheeler.

"She got Rolla Vollstedt to make sure the car was what it was supposed to be, and everything was right," Wheeler said. "And once she came down -- once we got her locked in -- tickets started selling OK. But when she made the field, we had the largest ticket sales we've ever had in one day at the speedway.

"That was when we had two-day qualifying, and she was the fastest qualifier on the second day, even though she was 21st overall. That got a lot of publicity. If we qualified all 43 cars like we do today, it wouldn't have. But the fact that she was the fastest qualifier on the second day really ended up helping us. We ended up completely sold out."

Without Guthrie, Wheeler estimated "we would have been about two-thirds full. It would have cost us one-third of the house. That's a lot of money. A lot of money."

Guthrie wasn't worried about how many seats she had filled in the stands. She just wanted to make sure she made the race.

"I did make the field. I qualified exactly behind Dale Earnhardt and Bill Elliott. They comprised the row right in front of me," she said. "When I made my qualifying run, everybody had a stopwatch on me -- because word had gone around that the management wanted me in the field so much that they were going to falsify my qualifying time. Well, they didn't have to do that."

“

I came along and you heard all the same stuff: 'It's impossible. She'll never make the race. Or she'll drop out after 40 laps.' And of course all of that was nonsense, also.

”

JANET GUTHRIE

Guthrie wasn't the first woman to compete in a NASCAR Cup race. There had been 10 others. But none had ever dared to attempt driving in more than a 200-mile event, and all had previously done so in the very early formative years of the sport.

She mostly stayed out of trouble on the day and ended up with the 15th-place finish, 21 laps behind winner David Pearson.

"She got in my way a couple of times," Pearson said afterward. "But I think she did a pretty good job for a rookie."

Veteran Dave Marcis also offered high praise.

"We need more rookies like her," he insisted. "She watched her mirror and got out of the way when faster cars were coming up on her. I think she's got enough experience to do a hell of a job."

Other drivers were not so impressed by Guthrie's effort.

"She almost wrecked Pearson a couple of times," Cale Yarborough said. "She was trying to prove a point. Now she ought to go home."

Richard Petty added: "My wife could have driven better with 14 screamin' kids in the back seat."

Guthrie said only that her strategy was "to run as hard as I could, as traffic permitted. I think I did fairly well."

A relief driver had been standing by in case Guthrie couldn't make the 600 miles. But she drove for the entire duration of the event -- which lasted four hours, 22 minutes and six seconds.

Years later, Guthrie would laugh at the suggestion of some current-day drivers that women lack the physical abilities to survive the demanding 36-race Sprint Cup schedule and all the long events that comprise it.

"Those theories carry no weight, none whatsoever. Absolutely none," she said. "Heck, let me point to Labor Day weekend of 1977 when I qualified for and competed in both the 500-mile IndyCar race in Ontario, Calif., and took the rookie test for and qualified for the 500-mile NASCAR race in Darlington., S.C. That involved crossing the continent four times in less than a week. ... No, that's just nonsense.

"I think the big foo-for-all back then is that no woman had ever competed on the superspeedways. The women who competed in the early days of NASCAR were on flat surfaces, mostly dirt, only one as long as a mile, and no races over 200 miles. I came along and you heard all the same stuff: 'It's impossible. She'll never make the race. Or she'll drop out after 40 laps.' And of course all of that was nonsense, also."

“

I believe the root of it probably is money. I said 30 years ago that what the sport really needed was a woman with her own fortune, and the rest of the stuff that it takes as well.

”

JANET GUTHRIE

Guthrie, 38 years old when she drove in the World 600 after years of excelling at lower levels of racing, never did land a full-time ride in NASCAR. She competed in a total of just 33 races over the next five years while also dabbling in IndyCar racing and at last fulfilling her dream of competing in an Indianapolis 500. In the 32 years since the '76 World 600, no woman has since run as many races at the Cup level.

Two-time defending Cup champion Jimmie Johnson was asked recently about the possibility of a woman breaking through to race full time at the top level of NASCAR in the near future.

"I've watched some very talented women come along, and had the opportunity to watch Erin Crocker [in mostly the Craftsman Truck Series] with [owner] Ray Evernham. I think it just takes time for a driver to develop, and I'm not sure all little girls growing up think, 'All right, I'm gonna be a racecar driver and I'm gonna dedicate my life to it,'" Johnson said.

"To be at the top level, it doesn't matter the gender. You just have to commit at a young age, and I'm not sure that's the first thing that's going to cross a young lady's mind, that she's going to be a racecar driver. But I think over time, and as NASCAR racing becomes even more popular, I could see that happening and I see no reason why it can't happen."

Guthrie is waiting for it, hoping for it. She said she has followed the careers of Patrick, fellow IndyCar driver Sarah Fisher and Chrissy Wallace, who, like Crocker, has competed in NASCAR's Craftsman Truck Series.

"I believe the root of it probably is money. I said 30 years ago that what the sport really needed was a woman with her own fortune, and the rest of the stuff that it takes as well. In a way, that's what Danica has had," Guthrie said. "According to USA Today, her parents spent six figures a year on her go-kart racing when she was a child and early teenager -- and not too many women's parents are in that kind of position. So she had a very good head start, and of course she does have the talent, and now she has the team as well.

"I used to say that it was 75-percent car and 25-percent driver. And in order to win, you have to have it all. The best driver in the world can't make the car go faster than it's capable of, or overcome poor pit management. On the other hand, the best car in the world -- if the driver doesn't have what it takes -- isn't going to win, either.

"So you have to have it all, and Danica is in that position. We have yet to see a woman in NASCAR who is in that position. Hopefully we will."