Countdown To Michigan: Bill Elliott Was His Most Awesome At MIS

They call him Awesome Bill from Dawsonville, and for a period in the 1980s, Bill Elliott was the most awesome at Michigan International Speedway.

Elliott has won at Michigan seven times, the most he’s won anywhere in a championship career that continues today part-time, even as he shepherds son Chase through the racing ranks.

But his one-time dominance at Michigan makes for a great case study of how NASCAR’s evolution can affect a driver’s track record.

Beginning in the second Michigan race of 1983, Elliott tallied an incredible 11 top-three finishes in 12 Michigan races. And he recorded all seven of his Michigan victories during that period, from 1984-1989.

“I just loved it,” he said recently via phone. “Even the first time we went up there and ran it in the 70’s. I fell in love with that place, for whatever reason.”

Winning, of course, has a great deal to do with it. Check out Elliott’s stats at Michigan in the period we’re talking about:

Crazy, right? Driving the Coors-sponsored No. 9 car for Michigan native Harry Melling, Elliott was virtually unstoppable in those years. Elliott’s Ford Thunderbird, coupled with his driving style, was a good fit for the 2-mile track in the Irish Hills.

“I really loved the racetrack, and at that point in time, the way the Thunderbird drove and the way we had our stuff set up, it all complemented what I did,” he said. “Everything just fell together.”

Elliott said the track’s wide layout suited his style, and once the team found a good setup, it was able to keep being successful.

In NASCAR, though, things change. No one can dominate at one track forever.

“As time went on, people got better and changed the way they did stuff,” he said. “But at the time we did it, we worked well.”

So what happened to make Elliott’s Michigan success gradually fade? In short, everything.

“At the time, what was good for me and bad for somebody else is now just the opposite,” he said. “What I ran well with and the way I looked at it is so much different today than it was back in that era.”

When he was winning at Michigan, Elliott said, he was driving a Banjo Matthews-built car with rear steer. Today, all the cars are front steer and the chassis, geometry and tires are completely different.

“To me, that’s why things change – why some guy dominates for a period of time at a track, and then somebody else comes along,” Elliott said. “Too many things change: The aero balance of the car, the construction of the tire, the compound of the tire, the evolution of the chassis. There are so many things that dictate how a person runs.”