Vintage Photographs of Vicki Wood, the Fastest Woman in Racing _ us

   

“Somebody wrote a letter to the police department that they didn’t think I’d make a good driver out on the public highway,” Vicki Wood told Autoweek in a May 2019 interview. “They took my license away. That was the worst thing they could have done to me. I had a nice car, and I had no trouble driving whatsoever. In 80 years of driving, I had one ticket and one slight accident.”

 
Vicki Wood (1919-2020) enjoyed ignoring speed limits as a record-setting racer between 1953 and 1963. In 1953, her husband took her to a “powder puff” race at Motor City Speedway in Detroit. She commented, “If I couldn't drive any better than that, I’d quit.” A week later, her husband had borrowed a 1937 Dodge coupe for her to compete and she finished ninth of the 25 women racing in the event that day. The next night they went to a race at Mount Clemens where she won her first race.
 
She became the first woman to compete against men in races in Michigan. She also set a number of women’s records at American race tracks, including fastest lap (130.3 mph) and fastest one-way mark (150.375) at Daytona International Speedway in 1959 and 1960, respectively, and at Atlanta International Speedway in 1961.
 
In 1958, a magazine ad for Pontiac automobiles featured Wood in a photograph and the accompanying text that noted “... Vicki Wood and her ‘58 Pontiac taught men drivers a lesson in winning the 50 m.p.h. safe passing event.”
 
Wood retired from racing in 1963. In the late 1960s she and her husband moved to Florida, where she worked in a department store.
 
Vintage Photographs of Vicki Wood

Vintage Photographs of Vicki Wood

Vintage Photographs of Vicki Wood

Vintage Photographs of Vicki Wood

Vintage Photographs of Vicki Wood

Vintage Photographs of Vicki Wood

Vintage Photographs of Vicki Wood

Vintage Photographs of Vicki Wood

Vintage Photographs of Vicki Wood

Vintage Photographs of Vicki Wood

Vintage Photographs of Vicki Wood

Vintage Photographs of Vicki Wood

Vintage Photographs of Vicki Wood

Vintage Photographs of Vicki Wood

Vintage Photographs of Vicki Wood

Vintage Photographs of Vicki Wood

Vintage Photographs of Vicki Wood

Vintage Photographs of Vicki Wood