1981 Mountain Dew 500 - NASCAR Race
| Name of Race: | 1981 Mountain Dew 500 |
| Name of Track: | Pocono Raceway |
| Date: | July 26th |
Buy Tires Used on the Pocono Raceway Track

Pocono Raceway
Pocono Raceway (formerly Pocono International Raceway) is a NASCAR sanctioned superspeedway located in the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania at Long Pond. It is the site of two annual NASCAR Nextel Cup races held just weeks apart in June and July.
Pocono Is Like No Other NASCAR TrackPocono Raceway has a unique design. Each turn is modeled after turns at 3 different tracks. Turn One was modeled after the now defunct Trenton Speedway, Turn Two is like Indianapolis Motor Speedway and Turn 3 is similar to The Milwaukee Mile.
It could be said to be a tri-oval, but the turns are much more severe than those of a more typical tri-oval such as Daytona and the track is really nearly a triangle. They have been likened somewhat to the hairpin-style turns of road courses. An additional complication is that none of the three turns are identical, nor are any of the three straights identical in length. The long frontstrech often requires a gear change due to the high RPMs attained.The banking of each turn is considerably less than on many other long ovals. Although the track is long (2.5 miles) the sharp nature of the turns tends to make the overall speeds much lower than at other tracks of similar lengths thus restrictor plates are not needed here.
The odd design makes the setup of the car and the crews' ability to make chassis adjustments even more crucial here than at many other tracks. Often it is the difference between a winning performance and near-disaster. Drivers tend to either love the track or hate it, largely depending on how well it suits their driving style and their crews' abilities.
Courtesy of Wikipedia.1981 Mountain Dew 500 NASCAR Race Results
Below are the race results for 1981 Mountain Dew 500, in order of finishing place.
| Fin | Driver | Num | Start | Money | Laps | Pts | Status | Sponsor |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Darrell Waltrip | 11 | 1 | $23,640 | 200 | 0 | running | Mountain Dew |
| 2 | Richard Petty | 43 | 4 | $18,915 | 200 | 0 | running | STP |
| 3 | Benny Parsons | 15 | 3 | $13,515 | 200 | 0 | running | Melling Tool |
| 4 | Harry Gant | 33 | 6 | $4,990 | 200 | 0 | running | Skoal Bandit |
| 5 | Cale Yarborough | 27 | 10 | $4,290 | 200 | 0 | running | Valvoline |
| 6 | Ricky Rudd | 88 | 7 | $86,665 | 199 | 0 | running | Gatorade |
| 7 | Buddy Baker | 1 | 12 | $2,690 | 199 | 0 | running | UNO / Caesars Pocono Resorts |
| 8 | Kyle Petty | 42 | 9 | $4,750 | 198 | 0 | running | STP |
| 9 | Tim Richmond | 12 | 22 | $3,090 | 198 | 0 | running | UNO / Caesars Pocono Resorts |
| 10 | Ron Bouchard | 47 | 14 | $5,325 | 198 | 0 | running | Race Hill Farm |
| 11 | Dale Earnhardt | 2 | 8 | $9,190 | 198 | 0 | running | Wrangler |
| 12 | Gary Balough | 75 | 15 | $4,330 | 196 | 0 | running | Ferrailuolo & Sons Excavating |
| 13 | Terry Labonte | 44 | 5 | $7,240 | 196 | 0 | running | Stratagraph |
| 14 | Stan Barrett | 22 | 19 | $1,615 | 196 | 0 | running | Skoal Bandit |
| 15 | Jody Ridley | 90 | 16 | $4,745 | 195 | 0 | running | Truxmore / Sunny King |
| 16 | Buddy Arrington | 67 | 23 | $3,485 | 195 | 0 | running | Hills Racing |
| 17 | Mike Alexander | 37 | 17 | $1,295 | 195 | 0 | running | Rogers Auto Leasing |
| 20 | Joe Booher | 40 | 30 | $1,220 | 189 | 0 | running | Booher Farms |
| 21 | Cecil Gordon | 24 | 31 | $2,910 | 187 | 0 | running | Gordon Racing |
| 22 | James Hylton | 48 | 26 | $2,775 | 185 | 0 | crash | Palatine Auto Parts |
| 23 | Richard Childress | 3 | 21 | $2,590 | 185 | 0 | running | Nichols |
| 24 | Al Loquasto | 99 | 32 | $2,345 | 184 | 0 | running | Schaefer Beer / Z95 |
| 25 | Bobby Allison | 28 | 13 | $6,655 | 179 | 0 | running | Hardee's |
| 27 | Lake Speed | 66 | 24 | $2,260 | 170 | 0 | running | Speed Racing |
| 28 | Lowell Cowell | 17 | 33 | $2,225 | 149 | 0 | running | Kings Inn Daytona |
| 29 | Morgan Shepherd | 5 | 11 | $5,930 | 139 | 0 | valve | Performance Connection |
| 30 | Bruce Jacobi | 8 | 35 | $955 | 117 | 0 | ignition | Satterfield Air Conditioning |
| 31 | Tommy Gale | 64 | 20 | $2,130 | 94 | 0 | engine | Sunny King Ford & Honda |
| 33 | Dave Marcis | 71 | 18 | $1,380 | 83 | 0 | engine | Norton Company |
| 34 | Neil Bonnett | 21 | 2 | $1,350 | 80 | 0 | wheel | Purolator |
| 35 | Ronnie Thomas | 25 | 28 | $1,340 | 62 | 0 | cyl head | Shelton Construction |


