With 13 days remaining until the 2013 Daytona 500, we recall a genuine NASCAR legend, Smokey Yunick’s number 13 Chevelle. 

Surely, the black ’66 Chevelle (there were several, actually) has been written and talked about more than any other single race car in NASCAR history. Some of the material is even true, probably. It’s difficult to separate the fact from the myth. How did Yunick’s Chevelle become so wrapped in legend?

Without prejudice we note that first, Smokey loved a good story as much as anyone. If you’ve read his freewheeling three-part autobiography, you’ve witnessed a master storyteller in action.

And Yunick also knew that the secret of magic is misdirection. Every moment Yunick’s competitors spent looking at and thinking about his car was a moment they weren’t looking at or thinking about their own cars.

So no, Smokey’s ’66 Chevelle wasn’t 7/8 or 15/16 scale or any of that jazz. That’s preposterous. It was just tucked in real good all around, that’s all. It’s a mighty fine story, though, you have to admit. People still tell it to this day.

Maybe the true story of Smokey’s Chevelle is even better. Sure. The true story, whatever that is.

If you’re interested in sorting out the saga of the black Chevelle yourself, two good places to start are with Yunick’s aforementioned memoir,  Best Damn Garage in Town, or Chevrolet = Racing? Fourteen Years of Raucous Silence! 1957-1970, by ex-Chevrolet R&D engineer Paul Van Valkenburgh. Both are worthy of a place on any gearhead’s bookshelf.

Blown engine

Pit stop, Daytona 

Smokey Yunick with Chevelle

NASCAR press release October 6, 1966

957 Beach Street, Daytona Beach, November 2003