1:24 Junior Johnson Racing 1978 Oldsmobile driven by Cale Yarborough

Three titles in a row and the car that was there

Cale Yarborough added his third championship title in a row in the 1978 season, and nobody had managed that before him. He drove for Junior Johnson's stable with car number 11 and came through the year with ten wins, that is with a record practically never repeated in the later decades. The Oldsmobile with the designation 442 was one of the bodies the team ran on track in the second half of the 1970s.

Junior Johnson was a figure in his own right. Before he became a team owner he had spent years behind the wheel and was known, among other things, for being the first to make systematic use of running in a rival's slipstream on the long ovals. His stable then belonged for two decades among the technically best prepared in all of oval racing, and the owner's name became a household word outside the sports pages as well.

Notes on the build

A body from the end of the 1970s is longer and more softly shaped than the later generations, which makes sanding the parting seams easier for the modeler but makes masking harder. The horizontal lines of the lettering are the key: if they are not parallel with the sill, the eye notices at once that the body sits crooked. It pays, therefore, to paint and apply the markings only after dry-fitting the glass and the bumpers.

The set suits a modeler who has no trouble with a thin coat of paint and clean work with masking film. In a collection it goes well with the other American oval specials of this era, because 1:24 predominates among them.

Why this particular year

The year 1978 closes the time when big American sedans and coupes raced on the ovals practically in their production form. Three seasons later came shorter bodies and with them a different style of driving, so cars of this year are a recognition mark of the older school in a collection.