Winston Cup Series #1 Pontiac

    Today I've decided to mix things up a bit and talk about a promotional item, the NASCAR Winston Cup Series 16 oz. mug, put out by Howw Manufacturing Incorporated~ This mug features a Winston Cup Series #1 Pontiac in the bottom of it, and it was produced for the 1991 season~

    Howw Mfg. Inc., to this day, is a supplier of promotional drink ware, and has been in business since 1984~ This specific mug stands 5 1/2 inches tall, and features the Winston Cup Series #1 Pontiac resting on a checkered bottom, sealed in the base~

                                                   Winston Cup Series #1 Pontiac mug~

    I first came about this car while going through a box of items bought at an auction by my Father~ The mug was in horrible condition, with most of all the paint chipped off of it~ Because of this, I simply cracked the mug open to get the Racing Champions car out of it~ About a month after I did this, I came across a perfect condition mug at the Salvation Army, and picked it up for a dollar~ It has since become my daily water mug that I use at home~

                              Custom Winston Cup Series #1 Pontiac Racing Champions card~

    I consider myself to be an avid Racing Champions fan, as these are the cars that started it all, and the ones I grew up with~ So finding a mug like this was a true gem to add to my collection~ Each sip of water I drink out of it tastes better than any water I've ever drank, simply due to the fact that I get to look at a RC car every time I take a drink~ Obviously it doesn't change the taste of the water, it's all in my head.. but it does make it much more enjoyable to be able to see a RC car in a mug like this~

                                                        Winston Cup Series #1 Pontiac~

                                                           Click pics to enlarge~

                                                           Right side of the car~

    This car is a special car to me because it features the words "Winston Cup" all over it, along with the famous Winston eagle~ Racing Champions got in a bit of trouble when they made Rusty Wallace's Miller car, and so they didn't make beer or tobacco sponsored cars that often~ Oddly enough, the mug I bought had a Wal-Mart sticker on the bottom of it~ I was, at first, under the impression that the car was only sold at the Winston booths at the race tracks... looks like I was wrong~

    I normally don't post pics of the other side of my RC cars, due to the fact that they look the same on both sides.. but with this car, they made a mistake.. so I had to show that~ If you look at the bottom picture, you can notice that it says "Winston Series Cup" instead of "Winston Cup Series"~ I got a laugh out of that~ In 1992, they made a 20 oz. mug that looked just like this one, and fixed that error, as well as put gold cone rims instead of the black ones featured on this car~ The 1992 car also featured Goodyear tires instead of the RC tires~

    I love the look of this car~ The gold stripe along the bottom is a nice touch, and accents the maroonish red of the car nicely~ The eagle looks as if it's about to attack the #1 and carry it away to feast upon it, which I find comical~ I give this car an A+ on the Racing Champions quality scale~ Obviously there are no videos on this car, as it was not driven in the NASCAR series, so I'm gonna just post a few random old videos for your enjoyment down below~ As always, thank you for taking time out of your day to visit the blog!~ :D

                                    Best of the worst NASCAR crashes~ Old School Racing~

                                     NASCAR steals victory from Ricky Rudd~ Sonoma 1991~

                                                 The day that changed NASCAR forever~

                                               The crashes that have changed NASCAR~