Seven-time NASCAR Cup Series champion Richard “The King” Petty has revealed the mind-blowing top speed he managed to hit during his legendary career, and fittingly, it came in arguably his, and maybe the sport’s, most recognizable car.

The 88-year-old 200-time race winner, who competed between 1958 and 1992, took to the wheel of Oldsmobiles, Fords, Dodges, Chevrolets, Buicks, and Pontiacs during his Cup Series career. However, when most NASCAR fans think back to “The King’s” heyday, it seems a safe bet to make that they picture him driving the 1970 Plymouth Superbird.

In a recent episode of the ‘Petty Race Recap’ podcast, hosted by “The King” and his longtime crew chief, Dale Inman, the two answered questions submitted by fans, with one asking what the fastest NASCAR was Petty ever got to drive during his storied career.

“Probably the fastest I’ve ever been was in the Superbird and probably [at] Talladega because the track was a little bit bigger than Daytona, and probably somewhere close to 220 miles an hour,” Petty explained.

“And, it was one of the deals where you didn’t realize the difference between 190 and 200 and 210, 220. You adapt to that speed and you don’t realize how fast you’re going. The only reason you ever felt like he’s going fast is when you hit something then you realize he’s going too fast.”

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Petty would go on to finish seventh in the No. 43 Petty Enterprises Plymouth at Talladega in both races there that season.

This topic led Inman to recall another remarkably high-speed run at Talladega the year prior, this time in the No. 43 Ford Torino Talladega. “We had a Ford that year, and the track actually opened before it was ready, and the surface wasn’t ready, and y’all was tearing tires up in two or three laps,” Inman said.

“I don’t think we ever tore a tire up, but we was pushing 200 miles an hour then. And I think you qualified 198 only running two laps and if anybody could run three laps it was 200 miles an hour because they kept gaining speed back in the day like that. But the drivers certainly didn’t want to go out down there and run.”

Petty wound up boycotting the race along with all but two of the Cup Series drivers, according to Autoweek, due to concerns over the Firestone and Goodyear tires on offer and their ability to cope with the high speeds and fresh asphalt.

Today, the drivers still reach exceptionally high speeds, but not quite in the region of the Superbird. The current record for the NextGen car was set at Talladega in 2025 by Spire Motorsports’ Michael McDowell, who managed an average across a lap of 199.933 miles per hour, as per Racing America.

This feeds well into the debate of whether or not the drivers of today could handle the cars of Petty’s prime, with “The King” commenting, “Today’s drivers could have went back, some of them could, some of them couldn’t, because they would have grown up in a different society. 

“If they had to go from this society to go back to, no computers, no radios in the car, no power steering, no air conditioning, it would be hard for them to adapt, and it’d be just about as hard for the people that come along with me to adapt to what’s going on today. But if you lived in those particular years, then you adapted to it, so everything kind of equals itself out.”