Lake Chambers Speed (born January 17, 1948) is an American retired stock car racing driver. He formerly competed in the NASCAR Winston Cup Series, scoring one career win in 402 starts.
Background Lake was named after the best friend of his father, Bob Lake. Lake's father, Leland S. Speed, took office as the Mayor of Jackson, Mississippi, in 1948, the same year that Lake was born. He started his racing career at the age of thirteen racing karts, much to the displeasure of his family. Over the years, Speed won the International Karting Federation (IKF) National Championship six times and in 1978 at age 30, he won the prestigious Senior Division Karting World Championship over, among others, future three-time Formula One champion Ayrton Senna, who was 18 years old at the time. Speed had been the only American to win the Karting World Championship until 2015 when 14 year-old Logan Sargeant of Florida won the KFJ World Karting Championship.
NASCAR career
1980–1984 In 1980 Speed started nineteen races in his rookie year scoring an eighth at Darlington Speedway in his third career start. Speed also scored finishes of seventh at the spring Talladega Superspeedway race, eighth at Talladega's fall event, seventh at Charlotte's fall event and eighth at the season ending race at Ontario Motor Speedway. Speed finished 22nd in overall points and second to Jody Ridley in the rookie of the year standings.
In 1981, Speed again ran his own operation starting 27 of the 31 races on the schedule. Lake was unable to qualify for the 1981 Daytona 500, but did manage to win the thirty-lap consolation race, leading the race from start to finish. He scored a ninth-place finish in both races at Rockingham and at Bristol. He followed that up with a seventh in Martinsville Speedway's spring event, an eighth at the now-defunct Texas World Speedway and a sixth in the late summer Talladega event. Speed's final top ten would come at Bristol in August where he finished seventh. The final points tally came up with Speed finishing eighteenth in points. One special footnote for Speed during the '81 season was that he enabled future NASCAR pace car driver Elmo Langley to start his 536th and final NASCAR race at Dover in the Mason-Dixon 500. Langley started 29th and finished 29th completing only six laps before a driveshaft failure.
1982 was Speed's first full year of competition on the Winston Cup circuit. This time, Speed was driving for the first time for another car owner, Roger Hamby. The beginning of the season was a struggle with Speed not obtaining a top ten finish until the eleventh race, at Dover International Speedway. In July at Daytona, Speed scored his second top-ten finish with a ninth. Speed continued to struggle as the season wrapped up managing to finish sixth in the Southern 500 at Darlington and eighth at the fall event at the North Wilkesboro Speedway. Speed finished twentieth in points.
1983 was a year of major change for Speed. He was now driving for an established owner in Hoss Ellington, however on a limited schedule. The team showed promise early in the season scoring a fourth at Rockingham and a sixth at Darlington. It was at Talladega where Speed's life took a major change. Towards the race's end, Speed was leading the field with a chance to win his first Cup race. He was beaten at the end by Richard Petty and Benny Parsons. After the race, Speed decided to change his life and become a devout Christian. The week after Talladega, Speed scored another top ten with a sixth in the World 600 at Charlotte. Speed's final top ten of the season was the August Michigan International Speedway race with an eighth-place finish. Speed finished 27th in the points standings.
1984 was much the same. Starting 19 of the series' 30 races, Speed showed some early season strength with a third at Rockingham, a ninth at Atlanta and a sixth at Charlotte. At the first Pocono Raceway race, Speed qualified second and finished tenth following that up with a fifth at Michigan. Speed finished eighth in the late summer Talladega race and had a near win in the Southern 500 starting second and leading 28 laps before he crashed out. Speed's final top-ten was at Atlanta with a seventh-place finish and 26th in points.
Speed also started six races in the NASCAR Busch Series between 1983 and 1984. He only made one start in 1983, at Charlotte in the Miller Time 300, where he finished sixth. In 1984, Speed lost by two feet to Darrell Waltrip in the season opening Goody's 300 at Daytona, and scored another top five in the Mello Yello 300 at Charlotte. Speed's worst qualifying effort was a thirteenth place start in the season opener. Speed's starts were fifth at Darlington, seventh at Charlotte, third at Darlington and ninth at Charlotte.
1985–1989 1985 was Speed's breakout season in NASCAR. Running a full schedule under the RahMoc Enterprises banner, Speed started off the season with a second-place finish to Bill Elliott in the Daytona 500. CBS's pit reporter Mike Joy conducted an interview with Speed after the race, during which the emotional driver repeatedly thanked God for the successful showing. He followed that up with a tenth at Richmond International Raceway and a fourth at Rockingham, taking the points lead early in the season. After an engine problem at Atlanta, Speed scored a string of strong runs: seventh at Bristol, ninth at Darlington, ninth at North Wilkesboro, eighth at Martinsville and tenth at Talladega. Speed then finished sixth in the World 600. The stretch run of the season took its toll on the team and Speed's position in the points fell; however, he continued to post strong runs, finishing seventh at Talladega, tenth at Bristol, tenth at Dover and seventh and ninth-place finishes at Atlanta and Riverside International Raceway to round out the season. Overall, it was Speed's best year in terms of points, notching a tenth-place finish.
Speed started off the 1986 season with a tenth in the Daytona 500 and a tenth at Rockingham but after the fourth race of the season, he was ousted from the ride. Speed started one more race that season, filling in for the ailing Rick Wilson in his Morgan-McClure Motorsports ride at Charlotte finishing fourteenth. Shortly thereafter, Speed began working again at starting his own race team.
1987 was a building year in many ways. With sponsorship from Wynn's Car Care products, Kmart and Delco Battery, Speed built an entirely new race team with himself as the owner, and veteran crew chief Darrell Bryant helping him to build the operation. The purple and white Oldsmobile donned the number 83, in honor of the year Lake became a born-again Christian. In his thirteen starts Speed finished ninth in the first Talladega race and followed that up with a third-place finish in the World 600. Speed's other two top ten finishes were at the same tracks, seventh place at both Talladega and Charlotte.
The team's strong 1987 performances continued in 1988. With strong support from the Hoosier tire company, Speed ran strong in the Daytona 500 before dropping out due to an engine failure. The next race, at Richmond, Speed ran up front leading sixty-seven laps but finished sixth. The following race, at Rockingham, Speed again showed power, leading fifty-one laps and finishing second to Neil Bonnett. Speed's first win came March 27 at Darlington in the TranSouth 500. After starting the race eighth, Speed methodically moved his way to the front before eventually taking the lead and running away from the field. Leading 178 of the 367 laps, Speed beat Alan Kulwicki by half a straightaway to secure his first and only NASCAR Winston Cup win. One of the factors in Speed's victory was that he was the only driver who tested the Hoosier tires at Darlington. Where most of his competitors thought that the Hoosiers would blister, Lake and his team believed that they would not.
At Dover, Speed finished fourth, following that up with finishes of ninth at Daytona and fifth at Michigan. In the Volunteer 500, Speed led sixty-six laps and looked like a strong contender for the race win before blowing a right front tire and hitting the wall, effectively ending his day. Speed's last top ten came at the 1988 Delaware 500 with a ninth-place effort. The season ended with Speed seventeenth place in the final points rundown.
Speed had strong finishes in 1989 with a Bull's Eye Barbecue Sauce sponsorship Speed said was "worth peanuts." At Rockingham, Lake took eighth and a few weeks later he finished tenth Darlington. Speed finished fifth in the inaugural event at Sears Point (now Sonoma) Raceway and a seventh a few races later at Michigan. However, in the July race at Pocono, Speed was injured in a two-car wreck that also injured driver Greg Sacks. Although Sacks' car overturned, Speed was injured more severely, and missed several races. While Lake recovered from his injuries, he had several drivers drive in his place including Joe Ruttman at Talladega, Michigan and Bristol; Eddie Bierschwale at Watkins Glen; and Rodney Combs at Darlington. Lake returned to action in the Miller High Life 400 at Richmond to finish 14th. At the final race of the '89 season at Atlanta, Lake was able to conclude a personally disappointing year with a tenth-place run.
1990–1994 In 1990, Speed started only six races with Prestone sponsorship, finishing two of them. The best finish of Lake's abbreviated 1990 season came at Talladega's Die Hard 500 with an eleventh place effort. Speed also fielded cars for short track ace Tommy Ellis and Phil Parsons in two races. Ellis started the Delaware 500 at Dover in 31st and finished 32nd after an engine failure. In the National 500 at Charlotte, Parsons drove Speed's car with Baja Boats sponsorship to an eighteenth place run. 1991 was an improvement in terms of races started. Speed replaced Dick Trickle in Cale Yarborough's car but struggled with mechanical failures throughout his stint with the team. In twenty starts, Speed's best finish was an eleventh at Bristol in August. In 1992, Speed got back to his own team starting just nine races with Purex as his sponsor. The team suffered several mechanical failures and Speed only managed to have a best finish of eighteenth in the final two races of the season at Phoenix and Atlanta.
After driving his own car during a handful of races in the 1993 season's first half, Speed was called to drive for Robert Yates Racing, filling in following Davey Allison's death. Speed qualified fourth at Watkins Glen International. He followed that up with a second place start at Michigan and a seventh place finish. The next race at Bristol, Speed was running a strong race before contact late with Rick Mast ruined his chances at a top-ten finish. After Bristol, Speed was replaced by Ernie Irvan, but less than a week later, on September 3, it was announced that Speed would drive the No. 15 Ford owned by Bud Moore for 1994, replacing Geoff Bodine, who would depart from Moore's Ford to drive his own team which he purchased following Alan Kulwicki's death. However, two races later at Dover, Speed replaced Bodine in Moore's No. 15, as Ford allowed Bodine to take over Kulwicki's former No. 7 for the last seven races of 1993, in preparation for his first full season as an owner-driver. Speed's best finish for Moore at the end of the '93 season was an eleventh at Charlotte.