McReynolds remembers driver on anniversary of his passing
RELATED: High 5: Remembering Davey Allison
As New Hampshire Motor Speedway celebrates its 25th anniversary, FOX NASCAR analyst Larry McReynolds, a guest on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, remembered another Magic Mile milestone: the first premier series race at the track, which was the last event for Davey Allison before a helicopter accident claimed his life.
After falling 63 points shy of the 1992 NASCAR championship, Allison’s No. 28 Robert Yates Racing Ford got off to a slow start, according to McReynolds, who served as its crew chief.
“I think we kind of got lazy between the ’92 and the ’93 season because we ran so well in 1992,” McReynolds said. “We didn’t work to make ourselves better, and we were struggling when ’93 started.”
The Slick 50 300 at a new New England venue offered an opportunity for the team to turn the corner, and it gave the team reason to be optimistic for the inaugural premier series race.
“We finally built a brand new car and went to Loudon, and we were leading that race with 30 laps to go and we had a car that was good on the long run,” McReynolds said.
“A caution comes out for debris with 30 laps to go. We were in a bit of a box. We had to pit so we pitted, and we ended up finishing third to Rusty Wallace and Mark Martin.”
It was the team’s first top-five finish in a month and sixth in the first 16 races of the season. An upbeat Allison did something on the way home that surprised his crew chief and fellow Alabama native as the No. 28 team headed to Charlotte and then on to Allison’s home in Hueytown, Alabama.
“Davey did something that night that I had never seen him do,” McReynolds said. “He always flew his own plane. I think it’s how he kind of took out his anxiety of the day, but he told his pilot and his dad, Bobby, ‘You guys fly the airplane. I’m going to sit in the back with the guys.’
“…we sat back there and he was so excited and happy because I think like he felt like we finally had hit on something that we had been missing most of 1993. He told me when we landed in Charlotte, ‘You won’t be able to get in touch with me tomorrow. I think I’m going to fly up to Talladega to watch David Bonnett, Neil Bonnett’s son, test a car.’
“I said, ‘No problem. I’ll call you on Tuesday.’
“Well, unfortunately, I never got to make that call because the next day was when he was killed in a helicopter crash at Talladega.”
Later that season, Ernie Irvan took over the No. 28 ride, driving the car through the first 20 races of the 1994 season before a crash at Michigan International Speedway sidelined him for for more than a year.
When Irvan returned to the No. 28 car in 1996, McReynolds was his crew chief, and that July, Irvan and McReynolds went to Victory Lane at Loudon, New Hampshire, for an emotional celebration in honor of the driver’s comeback and to commemorate the three-year anniversary of Allison’s passing.