Larry Zimmerman

Hometown: Montgomery, Michigan
Born: September 11, 1931 Died: Oct 15, 1993

 

Larry Zimmerman started at Prairie River Race Track with Mark Rader in the #73 car, they went on and won the championship at Prairie river in 1953. And then went on to Butler Speedway in 1954 and he won his first Feature race on 06-06-1954 and then began dominating racing in the tri-state area from (1954 to 1969).

 

Larry became an all-time fan favorite at Butler Motor Speedway for many years. He raced against some of the best racers in the area, a lot of them became Motor Sports Hall of Fame members, which included Marvin Carman, Jerry Carman, Harold Reynolds, Don Taylor, Hank Lower, Dick Slade and Lee Brayton and many more. He was and still is, to this day the greatest driver at Butler Motor Speedway. This era from (1955-1970) of racing there were over 80 to100 racecars that timed in every night at Butler Motor Speedway. He certainly was the hardest running and most accomplished driver from 1954-1969 to race at Butler.

 

From 1954-1969 Larry won 5 championships at Butler Motor Speedway, broke 8 track records, He was fastest qualifier 60 times in 11 years, and also won over 65 feature races with 9 feature wins in a row in 1961, he had 54 fast dash heat wins, 45 pursuit wins with 7 in a row in 1959. Then add in his second and third place finishes over the years (50 plus). And this is just Butler Motor Speedway track records.

 

He also had countless track records and feature wins at Angola Speedway (1964-1968) Prairie River Speedway (1952-1954) Manchester (1964-1968) and Avilla Speedway (1966-1967). There was nobody better then Larry Zimmerman from 1954-1969 when he competed every week with over 80 drivers in time trials, he consistently was in the top 4 ,and went on to win many fast dash, pursuits and features on Saturday night at Butler Motor Speedway . The records show he totally dominated about every race he drove in, with only 19 years of racing. Larry Zimmerman was and still is the best of the best!!!!!