Profile of Bill Elliott on Famous Like Me

This article is about the NASCAR driver Bill Elliott. For the similarly named film, see Billy Elliot.

Bill Elliott (Born October 8, 1955 in Dawsonville, Georgia) is a driver in the NASCAR Nextel Cup series. He currently drives the #91 Dodge Charger for Evernham Motorsports on a part-time basis with teammates Kasey Kahne and Jeremy Mayfield. Elliott drove the #9 Dodge Dealers/UAW Dodge Intrepid for car owner Ray Evernham from 2001 to 2003 and won four events including the Brickyard 400 in 2002.

In 2004, Elliott relinquished the #9 car to rookie Kasey Kahne and switched to a part-time schedule driving both the #91 Dodge Intrepid for Evernham in three events (along with the Budweiser Shootout) and his self-owned #98 Dodge Intrepid in three other events. Although he only made six starts during his first part-time season, he still managed to have some success which included a ninth-place finish at Indianapolis and second and third-place qualifying efforts at Texas and California respectively.

In 2005, Elliott continues his part-time driving duties which includes driving a 'retro' #39 Coors Dodge Charger for Chip Ganassi Racing in the Budweiser Shootout and the #91 Evernham Dodge Charger in several events.

Elliott made his first Winston Cup start at Rockingham in 1976. In 1983, Elliott gained financial support from Harry Melling and earned his first Winston Cup win at Riverside the same year. He gained sponsorship from Coors the following year. In 1985, Elliott earned 11 wins and 11 poles and also won the first Winston Million in the Southern 500 at Darlington. This earned him the nicknames "Wild Bill," "Million Dollar Bill," and "Awesome Bill From Dawsonville." In 1988, Elliott won the Winston Cup Championship.

Elliott fielded his own Winston Cup race team from 1995 until 2000, but was never as successful as he was with Melling and the Junior Johnson owned team, where he finished second in the 1992 points standings and lost the Winston Cup Championship to Alan Kulwicki by a mere 10 points.

Also, he has won NASCAR's Most Popular Driver Award a record 16 times which he last won in 2002. He withdrew his name from the ballot after that and the award will be renamed after Elliott when he retires from the sport.

Throughout his career, Elliott has garnered 44 wins in the Cup series, including 2 victories in the Daytona 500, as well as 1 Busch Series win at Watkins Glen. Elliott also holds the track record at both Talladega and Daytona, neither of which is likely to be broken due to the current use of restrictor plates at both tracks.

In 2005, Elliott was seen in several screenshots and videos for the EA Sports video game NASCAR 06: Total Team Control driving the #91 Stanley Tools Dodge. However, he was removed from the game prior to its release. The reasoning behind this is currently unknown, but it is believed to be due to licensing issues.

Teams and Sponsors

Teams

• Melling Racing- 1982-1991
• Junior Johnson- 1992-1994
• Bill Elliott Racing- 1995-2000
• Evernham Motorsports- 2001-Present

Sponsors

• Coors- 1984-1991, 2005*
• Budweiser- 1992-1994
• McDonald's- 1995-2000, 2004-2005*
• Dodge Dealers- 2001-2003
• Leukemia-Lymphoma Society- 2004*
• UAW/DaimlerChrysler- 2004*
• Coca-Cola C2- 2004*
• Visteon- 2004-2005*
• Stanley Tools- 2005*
• Auto Value/Bumper To Bumper- 2005*

* One-race or multiple-race sponsor

This content from Wikipedia is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article Bill Elliott