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#586 Rad-oh-yeah?

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Posted 23 May 2017 - 20:12

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Weighing the Triple Crown debate
Tuesday, 23 May 2017
Mark Glendenning / Images by LAT Archive


Fernando Alonso's appearance at this year's Indianapolis 500 has been heralded as a step towards an attempt by the Spaniard to become the second driver ever to win racing's Triple Crown. But as this piece, first published in the July, 2017 issue of RACER (No.285), reminds us, the definition of what the Triple Crown actually consists of is far from clear ...
 
It took Graham Hill a decade to accomplish the achievement that sets him apart from any other racing driver in history. Or maybe just nine years... The racing world is united in recognizing the suave Brit as the only holder of racing's Triple Crown – but less so over what that actually entails.

Conventional wisdom holds that the honor belongs to a driver who can win the Monaco GP, the Indy 500 and Le Mans. Hill, famously, made Monaco his playground: he scored five wins in the Principality. But where things get tricky is that Hill himself defined the Triple Crown differently.

"It's the World Championship for drivers, the Indianapolis 500, and the Le Mans 24-Hour race," he told a British TV host in early 1975. He cemented his stance with the follow-up, when he was asked which of the three titles meant the most to him.

"Indianapolis (MAIN) produced more loot than the others," he said. "Le Mans was very nice to win after so many years of trying, and that's the one that meant that I did win the Triple Crown, but out of all of those, one has got to say the World Championship, because it's a whole series of races over a complete year."

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It's a purely academic point, because regardless of where you draw the Triple Crown line, Hill still qualifies for the honor. His two world championships came six years apart – the first in 1962, when he gave BRM its only title, and again in '68, this time as Lotus's rock and leader after teammate Jim Clark's death at Hockenheim in April. (He also won Monaco in 1968, RIGHT). Those titles bookended his Indy win, which he earned as a slightly embarrassed rookie in the 1966 race, when a third of the field was eliminated in a crash at the start.

All were achieved by a driver in his prime – a description that was becoming increasingly difficult to associate with Hill by 1972. That year marked his 10th visit to La Sarthe (BELOW), and he made the trip amid increasing speculation over his future in F1, where the 43-year-old veteran was struggling miserably with Brabham.

But if Henri Pescarolo was worried about sharing his Matra MS670 with a driver in decline, he was in for a surprise. Hill may no longer have been able to dance on a knife-edge, but Le Mans back then demanded mechanical sensitivity at 95 percent effort, and that suited Hill just fine. He took the lead just after midnight, and later that afternoon, Hill's special place in racing history had been secured.

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#587 Rad-oh-yeah?

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Posted 24 May 2017 - 01:53

 

RACER's Robin Miller and Marshall Pruett take you on the first of a three-part narrated tour of the incredible AJ Foyt exhibit inside the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Museum.

 


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#588 Rad-oh-yeah?

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Posted 24 May 2017 - 12:28

 


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#589 Rad-oh-yeah?

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Posted 24 May 2017 - 14:39

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Rear View: Galmer, 1992 giant slayer
Wednesday, 24 May 2017
By Marshall Pruett / Images by IMS Photo, Dan R. Boyd
 

The smallest chassis constructor in Indy 500 field slayed giants like Penske Cars and Lola in 1992. On the way to sending Al Unser Jr. on his first trip to Victory Lane, the tiny Galmer outfit, with only two cars in the field of 33, stole the show as the Chevy-powered G92 chassis propelled Little Al and teammate Danny Sullivan to a 1-5 finish.

Using a name fashioned from CART IndyCar team owner Rick Galles who funded the project, and lead designer Alan Mertens, Galmer came and went as a CART constructor in a single year. An Indy 500 win— the closest in history, a controversial win by Sullivan in Long Beach, and third and seventh respectively for the Galles/Kraco Racing duo in the championship, and then it was back to customer Lolas in 1993.

Bankrolled by New Mexico's Galles with profits from his numerous car dealerships and the big-brand sponsors on the Unser Jr and Sullivan entries, Mertens was able to transform the team's personal R&D company into a full-fledged Indy car constructor. Twenty-five years later, we're still waiting for another upstart constructor to continue the tradition last practiced by Galmer.

The story of Galmer's steady rise and fast demise as an Indy car manufacturer, as told by Mertens in an in-depth podcast below, celebrates the last era where the Indy 500 was defined by creative expression.

https://marshallprue...lmer-g92-chevy/

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#590 Rad-oh-yeah?

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Posted 24 May 2017 - 20:49

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Rear View: 1967's STP Paxton-Turbocar
Wednesday, 24 May 2017
By Marshall Pruett / Images by IMS Photo archive


It's the Indy 500's defining car. Radical, mind-bending creations came before 1967's STP Paxton-Turbocar and a few have followed since, but nothing has come close to matching the engineering insanity or the undying interest brought by Andy Granatelli's dayglo orange machines.

Penned by Ken Wallis, the car – known simply as the "Turbine" – attempted to assemble every far-reaching Indy 500 concept at once in a single vehicle. Crafted with a chassis that used a central spine, its driver, Parnelli Jones (pictured below) would sit on the right of the backbone.

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On the left, a Pratt & Whitney helicopter turbine engine. At the front of the chassis, the front-wheel drive system was located where the driver's feet would have gone if its occupants were centrally located. At the rear, the same system was installed to drive the rear tires. All-wheel drive, a turbine hanging off one side, the driver off the other, and on top of the rear bodywork, an old Mercedes-Benz Grand Prix-style air brake system was employed.

The only thing the Turbine needed was an extra set of wheels to be hailed as certifiably crazy. Wallis' car wasn't the first to arrive at Indy with a turbine; the use of AWD wasn't new, and other builders had played with offsetting the driver in the chassis. As a single package, however, the Turbine was the ultimate expression of, well...everything a driver could ask for. (Additional photos in image gallery on next page).

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"It was just an exciting time, actually for something like that to happen and be as successful as it was," Jones said on the 50th anniversary of the car's debut. The 1963 Indy 500 winner, like most drivers at the time, was skeptical of Granatelli's wacky car. It not only defied convention; by the looks of it, the Turbine also defied common sense.

"Andy and I became pretty close friends at the time – we did a lot of socializing and he'd invite me to dinner and stuff like that," Jones said. "One day he called me up and he says, 'Come over to Paxton. I want to show you something.' So, I went over and they had the turbine pretty far along. I thought it was another wild and crazy thing on his venue. He wanted me to drive it.

"I said, 'Gee, I don't know, Andy.' I was testing my car over in Phoenix. I says, 'Well, bring it over and I'll take a ride in it, see what it feels like.' When they finished and brought it up over there, I took a ride in it."

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Its whooshing engine made hellacious power just as turbocharging was becoming the rage at Indy. Its chassis, with the centrally-located motor and driver, was a marvel of poise and balance on its four skinny Firestone tires. There were also a few drawbacks, and those came from trading a high-compression internal combustion engine for the free-spinning Pratt & Whitney turbine. Of the many legends about the car, the delayed response between mashing the throttle and waiting for the big turbine to spool up and make power gave Jones plenty to figure out.

"It had a three-second throttle [lag] in it at that time," he said. "You kind of had to guess at a lot of it. We ran pretty good. I was pretty impressed in Phoenix. Andy kept hounding me to drive the Novi, or the Turbine. So I thought, Wow. Gee. I had mixed emotions about it in between that and my car.'"

Granatelli needed a star to drive the Turbine – someone who would validate the concept and charge as hard as possible. Well aware of the situation, Jones made sure the compensation matched the potential risk to his reputation.

"I did have some pretty good thoughts about it," the 83-year-old said. "I thought, 'Why don't you just let money decide whether you drive it or not? That's a good way to make up my mind.' I asked myself, 'Would you do it for $25,000?' 'No,' I said, 'Would you do it for $50,000?' I said, 'No, I wouldn't drive it for $50,000. Would you drive it for $100,000?' I said, 'Well, I think $100,000 might convince me to do that.'"

In today's dollars, Jones commanded approximately $740,000 to race the Turbine at Indy. That's not far from what Carlos Munoz took home for finishing second more last year at the 100th Indy 500...

"I figured that I could make the race," Jones continued. "I never thought it was going to ever be as good as it was. But I thought it would be OK. I figured I could make the race, so ... Part of the deal was I had to qualify the car. If I didn't qualify the car, or I didn't make the race, I would be out the $100,000."

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Any concerns Jones had about making the field were quickly erased. Starting sixth, Jones immediately overtook polesitter Mario Andretti (who famously gave his rival the middle finger while being passed) and streaked away to lead 171 of 196 laps. The Turbine's pace throughout the month led to widespread belief Granatelli's drivers were sandbagging; running away with the race only served to confirm their fears.

The well-known end to the story, with the failure of an inexpensive transmission bearing that disconnected the turbine from its AWD system, spoiled Jones' surefire run to a second Indy 500 win. Jones' loss would be A.J. Foyt's gain as the Texan took his third 500 victory. Credited with sixth, Jones would sit idle in the pits as the final laps were run.

50 years later, Jones still finds humor in the sandbagging allegations.

"They thought I was sandbagging because it would quit accelerating about halfway down the straightaway," he said. "They'd drive by me and they figured that I was backing off. That's what created the sandbag. I had no reason to sandbag. I drove the car as fast as I could. I could put a higher gear ratio in the car. But I couldn't run as fast in laps time. So you run the gear ratio that gives you the opportunity to run the fastest lap, so to speak."

And despite a half-century of distance from the race he lost with three laps left to run, Jones hasn't softened his stance on where the blame belongs for the transmission failure.

"I never was a very smart race driver," he said. "Really. I wasn't an Al Unser or some of the others – Rick Mears for example – that were premium race drivers. I knew how to go fast. I just didn't know how to go long enough. I was smart. Not smart enough to realize how good this car and how much of a lead I had and everything else. I just did stupid things.

"I accelerated too hard going out of the pits. It was like a dragster because it had all that torque. That certainly hurt it. I just kick myself in the rear when I stop and think about how I blew that race away by my driving style.

"That's what I did. Anyway, Andy just cried like a baby because when it broke down in the garage afterwards. I felt so guilty because it was me that created the problem."

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#591 Rad-oh-yeah?

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Posted 25 May 2017 - 01:59

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'This place doesn't owe you s**t' – the Indy 500's close calls
Wednesday, 24 May 2017
Mark Glendenning / Images by IMS, Levitt/LAT


This feature originally appears in RACER's July 2017 issue (No.285) under the title "Close, but..."
 
"You cannot let this place get into your head," mused Tony Kanaan on a chilly morning at Indianapolis Motor Speedway last year. "If you do, it will ruin you."

Kanaan knew of which he spoke: he had led the race for eight years in a row, headed the field for a combined total of more than 200 laps, started from pole (2005), and finished second, third (twice), fourth and fifth before finally earning a portrait on the Borg-Warner Trophy at his 12th try in a 2013 thriller.

The Brazilian ultimately squared his ledger with the Brickyard, but others who experienced similar disappointments are still waiting for broken hearts to fully heal. Or are they? Marco Andretti came within yards of winning at Indy as a rookie in 2006, and was instead left crossing the line choking on Sam Hornish Jr.'s exhaust fumes (ABOVE). Even for someone not carrying the most famous surname in racing, that sounds like the recipe for a tiny streak of entitlement.

"I look at the flipside of that coin," says Andretti. "I look at how fortunate I am to be unscathed. I look at four or five podiums there. I look at stuff like that.

"And I also look at the fact that, in a perfect world, I've got another 10 shots at winning there. So I'm not panicking. Year in, year out, no matter what team I'm driving for, I know we can make some amazing stuff happen there. And once we win there...Indianapolis is already a big place for me, but that will be huge."

JR Hildebrand can relate. Driving for the small Panther Racing team as a rookie in 2011, the Californian flew beneath the white flags waving from the Speedway's flag stand with a comfortable lead over Dan Wheldon. As he crossed the north chute and entered the final turn, he came across the slower car of Charlie Kimball running on the inside line.

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Hildebrand moved to the outside as he came onto the final stretch, wandered onto the marbles, and pancaked the wall. Wheldon shot past for the win; Hildebrand – right-side flattened, and with sparks flying from the car's underside – skidded across the bricks in second place (RIGHT).

"I've had so many people tell me that Indy owes me something that it's really made me realize that, actually, it doesn't owe you s**t," he says. "When you think about it on your own, you can convince yourself that 'I'm going to go back there and everything is going to go my way because that's how things balance out,' but you listen to other people say that to you enough times and it really starts to sound crazy..."

Hildebrand alludes to another aspect to life as a member of the Indy 500's "almost" club. Coming to terms with the personal disappointment associated with a near-miss is one thing, but through the eyes of some on the outside, a crash like the one Hildebrand experienced in 2011 can define him for years. Instead of "JR Hildebrand, IndyCar Series driver", he becomes "JR Hildebrand, last-lap crash guy." Six years after the fact, fans continue to ask him about it.

"The way everything happened in 2011, I had to deal with it all immediately," he says. "There was no hiding from it. I was asked about it a million times, and I had to be at peace with it, just to not go bananas. I still have people walking up and asking if I go to sleep at night thinking about Turn 4. And to me that seems like such a crazy thing to ask.

"For one, I'd be going insane if I was going to sleep every night thinking about that. But I really don't. It just doesn't bother me. It's something that I have very much moved on from.

"I'm in a different place. The series is in a different place. The things that are required to win the race are different now. I've been very head-down over the last few years working on figuring that stuff out so I could get into the best possible position to get back out there and execute. And that, to me, is only what it's about at this point."

Realistically, is there any other way that Hildebrand, or Andretti – or even someone like Carlos Munoz, who was literally in tears after falling just short of reeling Alexander Rossi in last year – can keep their relationship with the "500" in perspective? It's often said that the Indianapolis Motor Speedway chooses the winner, and on that basis, the most any driver can do to control their fate is do whatever they can to put themselves in a position where they're not relying on a stroke of luck to get the job done.

Do that often enough, and maybe – maybe – the Brickyard will answer the call, just as it did for Kanaan in 2013.

"I always prepared myself for maybe not ever winning there," he said. "I trained myself not to feel too beaten up about whatever happened the next day. I always loved this place, regardless of what my result was. I was humble and just grateful to be part of the Indy 500.

"I call the Speedway a 'she,' because to me, it's a girl. And in 2013, she gave me back the respect I'd given her."

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#592 Rad-oh-yeah?

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Posted 25 May 2017 - 16:50

Prirucnik za razumevanje EjDzej Fojta:

 

 

 

:lol+:


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#593 Rad-oh-yeah?

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Posted 25 May 2017 - 19:48

F1 je imala doktora, IRL je imala zubara...
 

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Interview: Jack Miller, the Racing Dentist
Thursday, 25 May 2017
By Mark Glendenning / Images by Marshall Pruett


To some, Dr. Jack Miller was the symbol of much that was wrong with the formative years of the Indy Racing League: a kind of mid-'90s Milka Duno who could also take care of a root canal. Asked about the League at the time, Mario Andretti reportedly replied, "Well, they've got a dentist ..."

Miller was well into his 30s when, 20 years ago this May, he realized his life-long ambition of competing in the Indianapolis 500. Despite robust concern over whether his skills on the Speedway matched his clear talent for securing sponsorship, Miller contested two full-seasons of the IRL, and qualified for the 500 twice from three attempts.

He also acquired a peculiar cult status. Known at the time for throwing tubes of toothpaste into the crowd and for the mobile dental clinic that travelled with him to races, he says that he still receives autograph requests in the mail to this day, despite a career best finish of ninth (Charlotte, 1998) and 20th at the Brickyard (in 1997).

Nowadays, Miller continues to practice dentistry in addition to his numerous other business interests, and remains involved in the sport via Miller Vintanieri Leguizamon Moitorsports, a Formula 4 team that he co-owns with Colts star Adam Vintanieri, and which includes his son Jack among its driver line-up.

Two decades on from his first trip across the bricks, the "Racing Dentist" offers his own assessment of his career.

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Q: I saw a photo of your office, with the car on the ceiling (pictured, image courtesy of Dr. Jack Miller) and the memorabilia everywhere. I'm guessing that's a pretty effective distraction for your patients?


DR JACK MILLER: You'd be amazed ... people have sometimes been coming to us for years, and all of a sudden they'll say, "When did you put the racecar on the ceiling?". It keeps us humble that patients do get nervous when going to the dentist. They're not even looking up and seeing the car.

It's pretty neat. Patients do like it. We're getting ready to open our fifth office, so we're going to need to get four more cars. It was quite a feat getting it up there, but it was worth it.

Q: What's your background with the Speedway? Did you grow up going to the 500?

JM: I grew up in Indianapolis, and my parents would take us for practice, and qualifying, and the race, when we were kids. I knew early on that's what I wanted to do, but there were five kids in the family, and while we never thought about money growing up, they didn't have the funds to fund a racing career. And I wouldn't have asked them to do it anyway.

So I worked, and did odd jobs, so that I could have some sort of career if the racing career didn't work out, because I didn't start karting when I was a child. I didn't do anything until I was 26 years old, when I went to an SCCA weekend. They let me use the car on Saturday for the school, and then I did very well on the Sunday. And it just kind of took off – every penny I made, I put into racing. One day I sat down and watched TV, and I wrote down the companies that did a lot of advertising, but the majority of the commercials during the day were for health care of some sort – shampoo, makeup, and a lot of oral health care.

I loved medicine and science of all types, and I was either going to go to medical school or dental school. And it hit me that if I was a dentist, I could probably get a toothpaste company to sponsor me.

So my long-term plan worked out, and it gave me an opportunity to raise the millions of dollars I needed to do Indy Lights and then IndyCars.

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ABOVE: Dr. Jack Miller in Indy Lights at Phoenix.

Q: When did you get serious about the 500? Did the timing of The Split and the opportunity that might have presented to a driver in your position play a part?

JM: No. I wanted the Indy 500, and to be quite honest I wasn't happy about The Split, because the years that I did Indy Lights I loved doing the ovals and road and street courses. I was bummed out when The Split happened and the IRL was going to be a strictly oval series. But my goal was the Indy 500. We had enough money from Proctor & Gamble that we could have gone and run a full season of CART, but when The Split happened, I chose the IRL because of Indy. I wished at the time that we could have driven at venues other than ovals.

I've never blamed anything or anyone for my career. I wish I'd done better, but I realize now what I didn't know then. It's kind of like the old adage – you wish you could go back to high school knowing what you know now.

I did everything myself. I had to find the sponsorship, deal with the sponsors, deal with the team, race the car, and it was a lot of work. I wish I could have had a bit smoother path, but I'm very proud of what I did, and very happy, even though I didn't win an IndyCar race. I loved being there, and loved driving fast cars.

Q: Do you think you bit off too much at once by going to Indy when you did?

JM: No, it was the only way I could have done it. I worked 24/7, 365 days a year, trying to find sponsorship. I remember sitting at my desk on Christmas Day, typing up proposals. In the beginning it was extremely hard to find sponsors, and then one day I asked myself, "If I ran that company, would I give Jack Miller money to go racing?". And if I couldn't answer yes very easily, then I thought, "They're not going to say yes." So I had to modify my approach to finding sponsorship.

I'd say at the beginning it was less than one percent [success rate], and towards the end it was over 90 percent. I pretty much knew that if I approached a company, I had a plan in place and they were going to sponsor me. I learned what it took to find millions and millions of dollars by trial and error, and the bottom line was that it had to make sense to the company beyond just putting the name on the car. We put together some great programs.

I look back and I wish I'd had somebody coach me. I'd charge the corners on the road courses too much, and then I couldn't come out of the corners as quick. I was self-taught. And a lot of drivers were self-taught, so I'm not saying that I was the only one, but technology was getting better, there were guys with driving coaches, and if I look back, I'd have done a few things differently. But my goal was to make the Indy 500, and I did it multiple times. When I qualified for my first Indy 500, that by far was the happiest day of my life.

There's the Van Halen song that says, "I'm on top of the world, for just a little while." That's what I felt like that day. All the hard work and perseverance over the years paid off, and it was worth it to me."

Q: When you first turned up, a lot of the era's stars had gone with CART, but you'd still have looked up and down pitlane and seen Arie Luyendyk, Tony Stewart, Eddie Cheever and guys like that. Given your relative lack of experience, were you intimidated?

JM: Yeah, absolutely. I respected those drivers a lot, and it is a little intimidating when you're out there with them, I have to admit. But after the first few races, that kind of went away and they were just somebody else out there that I was competing with. Somebody like Arie Luyendyk... I'd watched him over the years, and he was a great racer, and I had a lot of respect for him. I had a lot of respect for all those guys.

I never felt like they were looking down on me. If they were coming up to lap me, I showed them respect. And I think they all liked that at the end.

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ABOVE: Miller (middle) in a heavy crash at Atlanta in 2001. (F. Peirce Williams/LAT photo)

Q: You weathered a lot of criticism while you were racing. What was your take on it?

JM: Obviously it hurt. But I owe everything to my parents; they are great people, and they taught all of their children that if you are going to do something in life, do it as best as you can. And don't let anybody discourage you from doing what you want to do in life.

If I had given up over catching some heat from the media, I think it would have killed my parents emotionally, [knowing] that we gave up. But no, I didn't like it. But I think sometimes it pushed me even harder. I'm always a positive person in life, and I know that these guys were doing their jobs. Of course you'd love to be the underdog and get a little praise: "Here's this guy that had a dream, he worked his tail off and did it all by himself." You'd like to hear those stories, rather than, "What's a dentist doing in the Indy 500?".

But 20 years later, I'm still getting people sending me pictures of the Crest car and wanting me to sign them. And that makes you feel good. So maybe some of the bad publicity made people realize who I am, and made them remember the Racing Dentist. Good, bad or indifferent, they know who I am. And it certainly helped me in life. It opened a tremendous amount of doors that I don't think would have been opened for me if I didn't have that publicity, good or bad. But I'm human.

Anger is an easier emotion than being sad. So it made me angry, but when I really stopped to analyze it, nobody could take away my experiences. That was what I really wanted to do in life. And I couldn't be distracted by any negative stories, because I was so happy racing. I absolutely love it. Would I have loved to win? Absolutely. But I had so much fun when I was out there that it didn't make any difference.

Q: You ran full-time in 1997 and then 1998, and then started to scale back in 1999. Was that due to funding, or were you getting busier with your business?

JM: Kind of both. It was trying to find the right team and put the right program together. I wanted to make sure that I had the proper funding.

I knew with Crest I had a three-year program – Proctor & Gamble typically does things in threes. And I wanted to make a change from the engine program that we were with, and Tony Stewart and Larry Curry said, "Hey, come with us," I was basically scaling back; I was getting older. So I said, "What the heck, let's put something together." I had a few sponsors but I needed the big one, and then I landed Olympus cameras. We did a multi-year deal, and then I got hurt in 2001 in the big Atlanta crash. I didn't have children earlier on in case I got killed racing, but by then I did have a six-month-old daughter.

That three-year deal with Olympus was going to be a very well-funded program, and when that crash happened I said, "I probably need to start raising my daughter." I talked at length with Olympus and let them out of the contract, and they let me out of the contract. I walked away from quite a bit of money that I could have kept, but that's not my personality. And I said, "I think we're done at this point."

Q: Were you ever tempted to stay in the sport as an owner? You were obviously good as building commercial connections.

JM: I didn't have the passion. The timing wasn't right for me to be a team owner. You have to have so much passion because the time and effort that you have to spend on finding sponsors ... it's grueling. I wasn't ready to do that. And for the next 10 years, every [Indy 500] race weekend I would go down to my house in Florida and go fishing and listen to the race on the radio, because deep down, I still wanted to race. But I'd made my decision. It was almost too painful to go to the Speedway and watch.

But when my son was born, it gave me a new life, and I absolutely love this new [F4] program that we've put together.

Q: Will you be at the Speedway this year?

JM: Oh, yeah. We love it. I don't have a particular favorite, but Gabby Chaves has done a lot of work with my son, and gone testing with us. So I think we're a little partial to Gabby winning the 500 this year. And I'm also friends with Dale Coyne, so I'd like to see a Dale Coyne car win. But we have a lot of people that we'd like to see win, so it's a lot of fun for us.


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#594 zoran59

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Posted 25 May 2017 - 23:11

F1 je imala doktora, IRL je imala zubara...
......................

 

Americka Superbike serija je takodje imala zubara.

 

Dr. John Wittner je '80-ih bio uspesan kao (privatni!)  trkac na Moto Guzzi motorima, a i "tuner" i konstruktor okvira. Do te mere da je da je fabrika kasnije lansirala "civilni" model Daytona 1000 - baziran na dr. Wittnerovom dizajnu.

 

u akciji:

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dr John na cestovnom modelu:

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... Few of us know John Wittner, aka “Dr. John”. This US dentist was also an ingenious motorcycle enthusiast. In the mid-80s, his Moto Guzzi racing twins were very successful in the US races. The most famous victory had been in Daytona in 1988 with a Moto Guzzi equipped with a brand new 4-valve twin designed around a special frame. ....

 

Vise o tom modelu i saradnji Wittnera i fabrike ovde: http://www.motorcycl...z13mjzbea.aspx


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#595 Rad-oh-yeah?

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Posted 26 May 2017 - 17:41

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Indy's Top 5 underrated aces
Friday, 26 May 2017
By Robin Miller / Images by IMS Photo


In its previous 100 incarnations the Indianapolis 500 has created heroes, hard-luck Harrys and row after row of drivers that tried hard but blended in with the scenery.

We know that Vuky, A.J., Big Al, Rocket Rick, Parnelli, J.R., Uncle Bobby, Gordy and Mario became legends because of their prowess at IMS and we recognize Lloyd Ruby and Michael Andretti deserved to win on more than one occasion but were denied in some gut-wrenching ways.

And there were promising kids like George Amick, Dick Atkins, Jimmy Davies, Mike Nazaruk and Jim Packard that were killed before they could make their mark.

But what about the guys who were fast each May who didn't win or didn't have the equipment or the results, or both, and pretty much operated incognito to the fans and media?

Watching the past 58 races gives some perspective but I can't know if Jimmy Snyder and Earl Cooper led all those laps and were underrated or unlucky and whether the paying customers recognized them any more than they did Len Sutton.

Roger McCluskey, Bill Vukovich Jr. and Tomas Scheckter weren't real good qualifiers but raced as good as anyone at Indianapolis and were also fairly well known to the racing public.

So here's one opinion on the five most under-rated, under-appreciated drivers in Indy 500 history who drove under the radar in my past seven decades.

DON BRANSON:

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Pappy was 39 years old when he came to the Speedway as a rookie and most people that saw him in Gasoline Alley without his driver's suit probably figured him as a Yellow Shirt. But Branson was a force, on dirt and pavement, in roadsters and rear-engine cars that twice started on the front row and had finishes of fourth, fifth and eighth.

"I learned a lot from him and he was a helluva competitor," said Mario Andretti.

Pappy was quiet and humble but he was also a Type 1 diabetic who had to keep it a secret because USAC would not have permitted him to race. The fans at DuQuoin, Springfield, Eldora, Terre Haute, New Bremen and the Fairgrounds' mile certainly knew of his skills because he was a master on dirt but other than the guys he raced against, he was Indy's Unknown Soldier.

PAUL GOLDSMITH:

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One of the most versatile racers ever – on two and four wheels. Goldy won the AMA flat track motorcycle show at Daytona on the beach and also the final NASCAR race on the sand. He captured a pair of USAC stock car titles and won nine NASCAR races and Smokey Yunick brought him to Indianapolis in 1958.

In six starts at IMS, he ran fifth and third (the only two times he finished) and was dogged by mechanical problems. He never got much notice from sportswriters or fans but he managed to make a pretty good impression on a guy who was also a rookie in '58.

"I think Paul is one of the most underrated racers I ever ran against," said A.J. Foyt. "He could drive anything and he drove it well."

ROBERTO GUERRERO:

Sadly, the most notoriety he ever got on-track was hitting the inside wall from pole position (pictured, below) on the parade lap while scrubbing his tires on that cold day in 1992. And then he made headlines with a miraculous recovery from severe head injuries in 1987. But long before a couple of the IMS public address announcers could correctly pronounce his last name, Guerrero was an instant hit at 16th & Georgetown. He finished 2-3-4-2 in his first four starts after leaving F1 and had victory locked up in '87 before his gearbox betrayed him. As friendly and polite as they came, Roberto was a talented kid who came close several times to becoming a big name.

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JIM McELREATH:

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When he had good equipment (which wasn't often), the Rookie of the Year in 1962 always produced – finishing third and fifth for John Zink and fifth for A.J. Foyt – and always made the most out of his 15 starts at Indy. He was sneaky fast, notoriously private and gave the media at least five good minutes a year. He drove hard and worked harder on his own cars.

"If Jimmy would have had equal equipment to A.J., he'd have given him all he wanted," said three-time Indy king Johnny Rutherford.

MIKE MOSLEY:

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He only led four laps in 15 starts and only finished in the top 10 twice but the introverted little guy who came to Indianapolis when he was 20 and seldom spoke to anyone but his crew and a couple pals was hell on wheels.

When the McLarens and Eagles were obliterating records in 1971 and 1972, Mose was charging to the front in a four-year old car (pictured, top) before it broke and threw him into the hospital. He went from last-to-first at Phoenix and Milwaukee (pictured at right, 1981) and quit in victory lane in '75 at State Fair Park because he was tired of getting hurt before realizing racing was his only meal ticket. He was a relentless racer who Dan Gurney loved after Mike stuck his Eagle with a stock-block in the front row in 1981.

Gary Bettenhausen said it best: "If Mosley ever gets a McLaren, we'll all be running for second."


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#596 Rad-oh-yeah?

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Posted 27 May 2017 - 19:52

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Rear View: The Andrettis' darkest day - Indy 1992
Saturday, 27 May 2017
By Marshall Pruett / Images by IMS Photo

ABOVE: The Indy Andrettis of '92 (from left): Jeff, John, Michael, Mario

Pain. Anger. Regret. All three worked inside Mario, Jeff and Michael Andretti during the Indy 500 in 1992. The remnants of that day in May, some items burrowed deep, others permanently attached, stressed the Andretti family to its limits.

Mario, the patriarch of the Nazareth, Pa., clan, was out first on the critically cold day. A rare mistake sent the 1969 Indy 500 winner hard into the Turn 4 wall, which left his Newman/Haas Racing Lola crumpled and his feet a battered mess. Jeff was next, victim of a broken wheel that sent his A.J. Foyt Racing Lola into the Turn 2 with obscene force. The damage to his lower extremities made Mario's crash look tame.

Michael was fortunate to escape Indy 1992 intact physically, but the crushing manner of his defeat – on a day where his mastery of the 500 was so thoroughly complete – left a mark that time might not be able to erase.

The renowned 200-lap contest, led by Michael's identical Newman/Haas Racing Lola for 160 of those tours, surrendered with 11 laps to run when his mighty Ford/Cosworth turbo V8 lost fuel pressure. Winless in 16 attempts spanning 1984-2007, the 1992 edition was his best chance of joining his father as a victor at Indy, but fate had other intentions.

Although the sting of defeat being snatched from the jaws of victory has lessened in the quarter-century since it took place, the hardships faced by Mario and Jeff have framed the 1992 race as a viciously dark day for the Andretti family.

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"You've got to live with it, but I look at that day, it should have been the best day of my career and it ended up being the worst day of my career," Michael said. "As I retired, that is what it ended up being. It was just a horrible day.

"God, to dominate this race the way we did...we were five miles per hour quicker than anybody else; [my] quickest lap was literally five miles per hour quicker than anybody else. And it was the easiest day of my life. But yet it was a really difficult race because first my dad crashes."

Michael dealt with the challenge of trying to win his first Indy 500 while processing the rush of emotions from seeing the aftermath of his father's and his brother's crash.
 
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"OK, then I get the report that [Mario] broke some feet but he's going to be OK," Michael said. "Then Jeff (pictured above) crashes and I saw his car when I was going around. And I knew it was really bad. And I never got a report. So every yellow, I'd be like, 'So what is going on with Jeff?' Nobody ever gave me a report.

"At that point, it's all most like, is he even alive? Keeping your concentration was really difficult. What motivated me to do it was, screw it, I'm going to win this race for Jeff. And then I'm just cruising. I was just literally cruising."

The precariously low temperatures meant pit stops to take on new tires came with a risk. Drivers would normally spin the rear tires leaving their pit stall to remove the slick sheen that coated the rubber surface. The small burnouts would also cause friction between the tire and the track surface, which warmed the tires and increased grip. Choosing to adhere to those norms, as Mario explains, would made the difference between finishing the race and crashing.

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"It was one of those years where obviously I'm in a hospital from a mistake that I made, because what was happening in the last pit stop – I was running pretty good, I was right up front," he said. Losing time in the pits under a caution period would influence his next actions.

"So by the time I went, I was [at the] back of the field," he continued. "What I did, which I figure I'm going to be easy on the gearbox and I didn't spin the tires to try to take the glaze away from the tires. So I took off easily. I figured I was in the back anyway.

"Obviously, the green went, I was in the back and I thought, 'S••t, I'm going to pick up half the field before I get to the start/finish line.' And I really dove down and really forced it down on the apron and the inevitable happened."

With rear tires that weren't ready to handle the speed he unleashed on the restart, Mario was about to pay a heavy price.

"I think if I would've just taken the glaze away from the rears, which I even do that with the two-seater, I don't get caught out," he said. And everything went wrong because [of] the temperature of the day and everything. It was something I was really forcing. So I made a stupid mistake."

Taken to the infield care facility, Mario was in his hospital bed while Jeff's unnerving crash happened.

"I'm in the hospital and they had me on ice; I didn't have anything threatening, [just] my feet and so forth," he said. "And all of a sudden, we hear a 'Code 3' and hear 'Andretti,' hear 'Jeff.'

"And then I remember one of the doctors coming over to me and saying, 'Michael is leading, Michael is leading,' giving me courage. I was in pain – he tried to put me away a little bit with happy pills. Meanwhile, Jeff was being cared for and so forth with his injuries."

Father and son Andretti, in the same infirmary, while Michael raged around the 2.5-mile oval. Before long, all three would be out of the 1992 race.

"And I come up on Al Sr., who is driving in the Buick, and I start smelling something and I'm like, 'I think that Buick might be ready to blow so I better get by him,'" Michael recalled. "So I pass him. And right when I pass him the engine just quits. So what I was smelling was my belt in the engine, which was what was burning. That was me that I was smelling, not him."

With his fuel pump no longer spinning, Michael's engine – starved of fuel – left him to coast to a halt as Al Unser Jr and Scott Goodyear inherited the chance to earn their first Indy 500 victory.

"Yeah, it's a great feeling," Michael said of owning the race until his motor quit. "Unfortunately, I couldn't enjoy it because I was just thinking about my family, with Dad and Jeff. It even ruined that. And not to capitalize on it and to end up coming to a stop with 11 laps to go, it's like, geez, the easiest race of my career turned out to be nothing. I had nothing to show for it except two of my family members in the hospital."

In the care center, hazy from the pain medication, Mario eventually figured out something had gone terribly wrong.

"All of the sudden, I wake up from a daze and the race is over and nobody's coming over to congratulate me," he said. "So I ask the nurse, 'Who won the race?' She said, 'Are you sure you want to know?' I said, 'Oh my God. Michael, lap lead almost two laps lead, nine laps to go. All my goodness. Oh, gosh. At least we are alive.' God. What a day."

EPILOGUE

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The one member of the Andretti family to end the race unscathed and running was Mario's nephew, John Andretti (pictured above). The Jim Hall Racing driver cruised home to eighth in his Lola-Chevy, which gave the greater Andretti family a small win of sorts. Twenty-five years later, Mario, Jeff and Michael live full and complete lives. For Aldo Andretti's son, the clean experience of 1992 has been replaced by a physical fight of his own.

The scourge of colon cancer – a far more serious concern than a bad day of racing at Indy – has thrust John into an important role at the 2017 500. Michael's entire Andretti Autosport team, six cars in all, have rallied to support John in his effort to raise awareness for the disease that manifested within his cousin.

"He is going through a tough time, no question about it," Michael said. "But John is an amazing guy, he's really strong. I just feel like he's going to pull himself through it. What is awesome is the message that he is been putting out there. And I believe with what has happened with him, because of it a lot of lives are going to be saved because I can't tell you how many people of come up to me and said that I went, I'm getting it, I made my appointment, I'm getting [a colonoscopy] done."

As the one bright spot for Mario, Jeff and Michael back in 1992, now it's their turn to repay the favor.


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#597 Rad-oh-yeah?

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Posted 28 May 2017 - 02:13

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:hail:


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#598 /13/Ален Шмит/

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Posted 29 May 2017 - 17:26

Lola founder Broadley dies aged 88

Eric Broadley, founder of Lola and one of the most visionary designers and constructors of racing cars, has died at the age of 88.

Broadley, along with Colin Chapman, John Cooper and Major Arthur Mallock, was responsible for the pioneering early boom days of the British motorsport industry, as he masterminded a remarkable variety of Lola models.

From the 1958 Lola Mk1, which was created using his £2000 savings and designed and built at a ramshackle West Byfleet workshop, to the mighty Lola T70s of the 1960s, the fearsome F5000 cars of the 1970s, and the customer Group C and F1 cars of the 70s and 80s, Broadley and his team created some of racing's most iconic designs.

After an early foray in to Formula 1 with the Reg Parnell-run Bowmaker Lola Mk4 cars in 1962, Broadley presided over a number of Formula 1 projects during the next 35 years. These included the first ever Honda win in 1967 - the RA300, based a Lola design and dubbed a Hondola, won the Italian Grand Prix in the hands of the late John Surtees.

Broadley was also behind the Graham Hill-fronted Embassy Hill operation in the 70s and the Larousse Lola of the late 80s and early 90s, with each one of these projects enjoying their moments in the sun as Broadley's team in Huntingdon cemented its reputation as one of the leading customer-focused operations in the world.

Lola's record at Indianapolis was the best of any overseas constructor from the 1960s to the 1990s. Graham Hill (pictured with Broadley below) became the first English driver to win at the Brickyard in 1966 with the Lola T90 Red Ball Special, while Al Unser Snr took the 500-mile triple crown - Indy, Pocono and Ontario - in a Lola T500 in 1978.

Mario Andretti, Bobby Rahal, Al Unser Jnr, Cristiano Da Matta, Nigel Mansell, Paul Tracy and Michael Andretti all took CART and ChampCar titles in Lola chassis, while Arie Luyendyk took a third Indy 500 win for the constructor in 1990.

All this was done against tough competition - March, Reynard, Ralt, Brabham, Eagle, Penske, the list goes on. Lola was always enormously respected by teams, drivers and engineers as a quality competitive constructor.

Broadley himself was quiet yet confident, but also often displayed an impish sense of humour that endeared the thousands of staff that worked at Lola. He was what would now be considered an old school engineer, who was never more at home than designing and developing a racing concept. The business element of his vision was usually directed by others, notably Derek Ongaro and Mike Blanchet.

His achievements as the brains behind Lola are staggering, and it says much for his benign and quirky personality that he was known as the 'engineer's engineer' rather than an effervescent personality such as Colin Chapman, Ken Tyrrell or Ron Dennis.

Like his beautiful creations, such as the Lola Mk6, Lola T212 and Lola T332, Broadley's actions as an engineer always led by example. There was little, if any, significant ego related to his work, but this didn't mean the man wasn't fiercely competitive. Indeed, a deep-rooted drive to compete was what set him on a remarkable journey as head of Lola.

In Formula 1 it never quite happened for Lola, yet still some memorable programmes scored respectable results. As well as the Hondola of 1967, there were the Larousse years when particularly in 1990 Eric Bernard and Aguri Suzuki punched above their collective weights to score a decent haul of points, including a podium at Suzuka.

By 1997 the Lola empire hit trouble after an ill-advised decision to return to F1 with the fateful Mastercard deal that failed so miserably. With Lola on the verge of collapse Martin Birrane bought the brand and set about rebuilding and investing in it.

Broadley was involved in various projects after Lola but largely enjoyed a peaceful retirement at his farmhouse in the village of Broughton close to Huntingdon.

Even after his era had ended at Lola, Broadley would occasionally frequent the workshops and talk to old employees. In 2008 John Surtees (pictured below with Broadley at Goodwood in 2008) drove a Lola T70 MkIIIB around the streets of Huntingdon with Eric in the 'passenger seat'. His joy at the occasion was typically reserved but genuine in its delight.

Some notable engineering names passed through Lola's doors, originally in Bromley, Slough and then from 1971 to 2012 Huntingdon in Cambridgeshire. Tony Southgate, John Barnard, Bob Marston, Patrick Head, Ralph Bellamy, Mark Williams, Ben Bowlby and Julian Sole all worked for Broadley in various stages of their careers.

Those who knew and worked with him will remember him with affection. The quiet man of racing, his vision and dedication to Lola deserves the same respect in which Chapman, Williams, McLaren, Dennis and Brabham are rightly lauded, because the influence he extoled to the motorsport industry was so vital.


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#599 Rad-oh-yeah?

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Posted 04 June 2017 - 20:09

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50 years ago today: Cosworth's first F1 win
Sunday, 04 June 2017
By RACER staff / Images by LAT archive


It was 50 years ago today – June 4, 1967 – that Jim Clark and his Lotus 49 scored the first grand prix victory for the Ford Cosworth DFV (for "Double Four Valve") V8 in the Dutch Grand Prix at Zandvoort. And it happened in the debut race for the iconic powerplant that would go on to become one of the greatest all-around success stories in motorsports history.

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The spectacular debut for the engine included a pole position for Clark's teammate Graham Hill in an identical Lotus-Ford Cosworth by a full half-second. Hill led the first 10 laps of the race before a broken gear in the camshaft drive sidelined him, but Clark dominated from there on. Clark went on to score three more wins that season, although the reliability issue that prevented Hill from scoring that first win also dogged the Scot, who finished third in the year's world championship.

Those issues were overcome by the following year and despite Lotus having lost exclusive use of the DFV, it reaped the rewards of its development. Hill – team leader following Clark's tragic death in an F2 race at Hockenheim that April – went on to take the first of 12 driver's and 10 constructor's world championships for the DFV. It was last used in F1 until 1988 – 21 years after its victorious debut.

A turbocharged variant of the DFV, the DFX, came to Indy car racing in the 1970s and quickly emerged as a dominant force. Developed independently by Parnelli Jones using ex-F1 DFVs from his F1 program, it scored 10 Indianapolis 500 wins, 10 CART and three USAC series titles.The DFV was also adapted for endurance sports car racing, and claimed Le Mans 24 Hours victories in 1975 and 1980.

The following documentary about the development of the DFV, "9 Days in Summer," was produced by the Ford Motor Company's film section:

 


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#600 Wingman

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Posted 07 June 2017 - 13:03

 

F1 vs Indycar at 'Monzanapolis' by Dickie Meaden on 18th April 2017

With Alonso ditching the Monaco Grand Prix for the Indy 500 Dickie turns the clock back 60 years and heads to Monza

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So Fernando Alonso is doing the Indy 500. We didn’t see that one coming, did we? But then we’d all got used to Formula 1 teams and drivers towing Bernie’s blinkered line.

It’s a huge shame that the catalyst for Alonso’s adventure has been McLaren-Honda’s desperate lack of pace, but the upside is the prospect of (arguably) the world’s best driver tackling (arguably) the world’s most daunting race.

What has this got to do with historic racing? Not much, except I love it when contemporary happenings spark random and rather exciting ‘what ifs’ inspired by events from the past. These tangential journies through Google and YouTube are the scourge of production editors up and down the country, for I do tend to get a bit distracted.

So, with apologies to the poor souls I owe overdue copy, today has been mostly spent drinking coffee and researching the ‘Race of Two Worlds’ or ‘Monzanapolis’ as it was evocatively nicknamed.

The brainchild of the Automobile Club of Milan, Monzanapolis was an invitational event held on Monza’s banked oval, where American race teams affiliated to the United States Automobile Club (USAC) raced against leading European teams of the day.

Many of you will know about the two events, held in 1957 and 1958. For those who don’t, it was an inspired mash-up of F1 and Indy racing. The mix of machinery and drivers was weird and wonderful, the racing held over 500-miles in true Indy tradition. Though this distance was divided equally across three heats to appease safety concerns, with an hour’s break between races for maintenance for the cars and, presumably a swift brandy for the drivers.

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1957 Monza 500 Miles -- 189 Laps of Monza Speed Track -- Three Heats -- Very Hot

1st: J. Bryan (Dean Van Lines Special 4.2-litre) 257.504 k.p.h. 189 laps
2nd: T. Ruttman (John Zink Special 4.2-litre) 187 laps
3rd: J. Parsons (Agajanian Special 4.2-litre) 182 laps
4th: J. Fairman (Jaguar 3.5-litre) 177 laps
5th: J. Lawrence (Jaguar 3.5-litre) 171 laps
6th: N. Sanderson (Jaguar 3.5-litre) 159 laps

Read the full report from 1957

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In these heady days before endless simulation removed the mystery, the European teams in particular took a somewhat laissez faire approach for the first Monzanapolis event. Perhaps unsurprisingly the Americans dominated the meeting, which immediately took its place in history as the world’s fastest race – eventual aggregate winner Jimmy Bryan averaging 160mph over the full 500-mile race distance – and for the fastest-ever lap: Tony Bettenhausen setting a new single-lap closed circuit speed record of 176.818mph. The mind boggles.

Things got more serious in 1958, with Ferrari, Maserati and Lister all fielding cars built for the unique demands of the event. The oval specialists from America still prevailed, but the competition was much closer. Sadly, despite its obvious potential, Monzanapolis never gained sufficient momentum to continue beyond 1958, but the idea of F1 and Indy teams going head-to-head in a special one-off race remains fascinating and fun.

Could it happen? Not prior to Bernie’s departure, no. But in this refreshing new era of Liberty Media’s enlightened governance, it’s perhaps not so crazy as it seems. The concept would have to be developed – no point running F1 cars against Indy cars on a pure Superspeedway oval, or F1 cars on a pure road circuit – but so long as the racing environment didn’t heavily favour one type of car a race could surely be made of it. Maybe a combination of Indy’s (or maybe Lausitzring) banking and infield course, combined with a race distance that puts F1 outside its 200-mile comfort zone? Anything to mix things up a bit.

Alonso going to Indy is a genuinely tantalising prospect, but an F1 v Indy invitational would be brilliant. I’m sure my naivety will have some of you slapping your foreheads with despair, but as a fan of racing past and present I’d be intrigued to see how the cars and drivers of the world’s premiere single-seater series would compare.

 

http://www.motorspor...ar-monzanapolis


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