Meet the first Black man to win a NASCAR race in 50 years
By Your Black World
Race car driver Darrell Wallace Jr. is the first African-American driver to win a major NASCAR race since 1963. Wallace won the race on the Speedway in Martinsville, VA on Saturday. He became the second African-American driver to win a race in the NASCAR series. Wallace is just 20 years old. He is considered to be a solid competitor throughout the entire NASCAR series and is nominated for the Rookie of The Year prize.
His performance is so upstanding that he could soon be driving in the top-tier Sprint Cup series that is reserved for the best of the best drivers. The current car he drives is a No. 54 Toyota that represents the Kyle Busch Motorsports.
Wallace has been been racing since the young age of nine as he grew up in Mobile, Alabama. He took many racing classes that included small car races such as bandoleros. He also learned how to drive legend cars along with large late-model machines. Since 2004 he has continued to promote mul-ticultural and female based driving in the often male driven NASCAR sport. He was able to get training from the NASCAR Drive for Diversity Program.
In 2010 Wallace won the rookie of the year award and he also was runner up in the NASCAR K&N Pro Series East Championship. Wallace has an even further list of accomplishments that includes being the first African-American driver to ever win the 21 Means 21 Pole Award in NASCAR’s Nationwide series.
The last African-American that won a major Nascar race is the late Wendell Scott who had a victorious race on the Speedway Park in Jacksonville FL, in 1963. His win was immortalized in the movie Greased Lightning.
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