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One of the best races in my recollection was the 1963 Charlotte 400. Fireball and Junior Johnson got into a duel for the lead. They swapped positions more time than I can recount accurately but it was a bunch. Finally towards the last third of the race Fireball blew the motor going into NASCAR 3. This is also the turn where he crashed and lost his life. At that time the infield of the speedway was pretty much red dirt and there was still a land fill in the infield at the spot where #3 made its turn. At any rate the race became rather boring at that point even to a 12 year old who'd never seen a NASCAR race in person. Johnson went on to dominate the remainder. I've never seen anything but pictures of that coupe. I did however work pits for a guy at Hudson Speedway while they still raced that type of car. He ran a 54 FORD in the Hobby division, don't recall what the old Duces and Stovebolts raced in. They also raced 327 Chevy's. That power out paced the track to the point I saw several of them go over the wall. That track's now long been closed and the last time I was there the infield was a swamp. Good ol days.

Fireball died in the hospital a couple of months after the crash,he was a great one!!! My mom and dad both were at the race.

My dad was a Methodist minister and at that time was minister on call at the hospital in Charlotte. "Memorial" if I recall correctly. He went to visit Roberts. As I recall he said he was burned over most of his body. You've got to remember back then most drivers only wore T-shirts, jeans, loafers or bike boots and a helmet. I recall Johnson riding with his left elbow propped up on the driver's window ledge.It was always said, at least in these parts, Roberts had the roll cage full of fuel for that extra gas mileage. This is one of those NASCAR urban ledgends. But Roberts' death like Earnhardt's brought about many changes in NASCAR saftey rules and inovations. Shame somebody's got to die before steps are taken to figure things out.

They did some times soak there shirts and pants in some solution???That helped,but no real fire protection!!