Kyle Petty

Petty was born in Randleman, North Carolina. He began racing at a young age and made his major-league stock car debut at the age of 18. He won the very first race he entered: the 1979 Daytona ARCA 200, in one of his father\'s mothballed 1978 Dodge Magnum race cars; at the time becoming the youngest driver to win a major-league stock car race. Later in the season, he made his Winston Cup Series debut; again driving a passed down STP Dodge Magnum numbered No. 42 (a number used by his grandfather Lee Petty) for his family\'s team. He ran five races and had a ninth-place finish in his first series race at Talladega. In 1980, he made a total of fifteen starts in the No. 42 (after crashing the last of his father\'s Dodge Magnums in one of the Daytona 125 qualifying races) and had six top-ten finishes (using what ever hand-me-down race car his father could spare), garnering a twenty-eighth-plac…