RIP Cotton Owens

[intocarss]

May he RIP

SPARTANBURG, S.C. -- Legendary race driver Cotton Owens, just named to the 2013 class of the NASCAR Hall of Fame, passed away Thursday morning according to a family member.

Owens was 89 years old.
Everett "Cotton" Owens was born in Union and competed as both a driver and a car owner in NASCAR over the course of three decades. Owens competed behind the wheel from 1950 to 1964 while serving as a car owner. He continued as a car owner until 1973.

In his career, Cotton Owens won nine times as a driver and had 38 NASCAR victories as a car owner.

He won the 1957 Daytona Beach road course which marked Pontiac's first NASCAR victory. Owens finished second to NASCAR Hall of Fame inductee Lee Petty for the 1959 championship.

As a car owner, Owens hired Junior Johnson in 1962, the same season in which he began a future championship relationship with another NASCAR Hall of Fame inductee, David Pearson.

Twenty-seven of Pearson's 105 NASCAR victories were recorded in a Cotton Owens car. The pair teamed to win the 1966 championship.
In 1998 Owens was named one of NASCAR's 50 greatest drivers.

Owens was announced as an inductee into the 2013 NASCAR Hall of Fame class in May along with Buck Baker, Herb Thomas, Rusty Wallace and Leonard Wood