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[Rad-oh-yeah?]

35 godina na danasnji dan...

 

[alberto.ascari]

A tribute to Gilles Villeneuve

 

https://www.facebook...02815569820259/

[Rad-oh-yeah?]

Tony Stewart hops in A.J.'s 1961 Indy-winning car
Wednesday, 10 May 2017
By Robin Miller / Images by Dan R. Boyd


The long-rumored pairing finally came together and one of the best-kept secrets of 2017 came to light: Tony Stewart is driving for A.J. Foyt at Indianapolis.

Actually, he did it Wednesday in front of a handful of friends and family, as well as RACER.com and ABC affiliate WRTV-6. But it was short and sweet.

Stewart hopped in the roadster his hero drove to victory in 1961 at Indianapolis and took a couple of memorable laps.



"That was awesome; it would have been fun to race it," Stewart said after taking a couple of laps in the Bowes Seal Fast Offy that was taken out of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Museum and prepped by IMS restoration magician A.J. Fairbairn.

 

"It sounded good and it looked good," declared Foyt, who beat Eddie Sachs to the checkered flag in '61 for the first of his four 500 victories.

 

The IMS Museum is paying tribute to Foyt this month with an amazing exhibition of the cars, photos and memorabilia from his unparalleled career.

 

"It's very flattering what [museum director] Ellen [Bireley] and the museum folks have done and looking at all those cars was pretty special," said the legend whose résumé includes 35 consecutive Indy 500 starts, 67 IndyCar wins and seven national championships.

 

"And having Tony drive my car today made it even better."

A two-time Brickyard 400 winner and three-time NASCAR champion, Stewart was always fast in his IRL days at the Speedway (1996-2001) but never made it to Victory Lane in an Indy car.

And he looked right at home in the front-engine creation of Floyd Trevis.

"I've said all along that I was born 20 years too early, maybe 30 been more appropriate for what I needed," said Stewart, who is running his first-ever Little 500 at Anderson the night before the 101st Indianapolis 500, where his foundation is sponsoring the car driven by Jay Howard under the Schmidt Peterson Motorsports banner.

Looking up at A.J., the multi-USAC champion then cracked: "Of course it's probably in your best interest I wasn't driving back then or you might not have won four times."

To which Foyt responded: "You'd have had to run second in a few of 'em."

Both legends agreed there was something about the 1960s and 1970s that no longer exists.

"I was on the pole here in 1974 and three days before the race I ran a sprint car at the Fairgrounds and won both 50-lap heats and my daddy and all were mad because Indy was in three days, but I was my own boss," said Super Tex.

"That's why I'm doing what I'm doing," said Stewart, who retired from NASCAR last year after 18 years. "I'll go run a different type of car and I can go anytime, anywhere if I get opportunity."

There's almost 40 years separating their ages but they're old-schoolers who speak the same language.

Edited by Rad-oh-yeah?, 11 May 2017 - 15:24.

[Rad-oh-yeah?]

Ser Sterling se oporavlja, konacno je pusten iz bolnice:
 

Sir Stirling Moss has been discharged from hospital, several months after being admitted with a serious chest infection.[...]

"He is thrilled to be back where he belongs," read the statement.

"He still has a substantial amount of recovery to undertake but says that he has determination and a great pit crew.

"He and Lady Moss are enormously grateful to the medical staff, both here and abroad, who worked so tirelessly to make all this possible.

"They also want to thank, from the bottom of their hearts, all the family, friends and fans for their love and support. It has been overwhelming and given them a lot of strength, smiles and hope.

"For now, they are looking forward to just lying back on their pillows in their bedroom and watching the Spanish Grand Prix."

[Rad-oh-yeah?]

Dzovi Marselo, filipinski Indikar vozac nastradao pre 25 godina tokom priprema za Indi 500. Ovaj udes je bio jedan od kljucnih za pocetak istrazivanja koja su dovela do upotrebe HANS uredjaja u auto-sportu zahvaljujuci kojima su spaseni nebrojeni zivoti trkaca sirom sveta.
 

Rear View: Jovy Marcelo, 25 years on
Monday, 15 May 2017
By Marshall Pruett / Images by IMS Photo & Marshall Pruett



Jovy Marcelo's soft features and permanent smile belied the fact that he was a championship-winning racecar driver on the rise in open-wheel racing. The Filipino driver, killed 25 years ago today in a crash during practice for the 1992 Indy 500, was largely anonymous – a new face in the CART IndyCar Series – at the time of his death. A quarter century later, he still remains a bit of a forgotten footnote in 500 history.

"He was real soft-spoken, but in the car, he was not afraid to race you hard, wheel-to-wheel," 1996 CART champion Jimmy Vasser said of his former rival. "I think of a young Paul Tracy – Jovy was the same way."

Born and raised in the Philippines before his family moved to the San Francisco Bay Area, the second-generation driver came to prominence in the Toyota Atlantic Championship, where he showed great potential in 1990.

After switching to the crack P1 Racing team the following year, Marcelo won the Atlantic title by four points over Vasser, his main rival. Long on talent but light on funding, the two young upstarts graduated to CART in 1992 with smaller teams that offered no chance to bother the big programs.

Their journey continued at the back of the CART grid, with Marcelo joining the tiny Euromotorsport outfit (pictured, TOP) and Vasser landing with the new Hayhoe Racing effort. Despite their humble starts, Vasser (pictured below with Marcelo in '91, Marshall Pruett photo) spoke fondly of fighting over mid-pack positions with his Atlantic nemesis.

"He was a great person," he said. "He came from a really tight-knit family. He was married with kids. He had a couple of small children. I knew his father real well – a real likable guy. He was the only pro driver I've ever seen from the Philippines, really. And he was a great competitor. He was a smooth driver, pretty quick.

"I think he was a great protagonist for me in the Atlantic Championship. I liked those years. And Jovy was a champion. That says it all right there. I was second in the championship. I had six poles and six or eight wins, but he pulled it out and beat me by four points. He was a well-deserved champion."



Veteran IndyCar team owner Derrick Walker gave Marcelo his first Indy car test. Like Vasser, he was stunned by the realization so many years had gone by since Marcelo's passing.

"He was just a nice, nice kid," Walker recalled. "Pleasant, a serious professional – very mature for his age. And his parents, his father, they were just good people to be around.

"We tested him and, like a lot of people that you meet along the way, you can't put a deal together because you didn't have the money to be able to make anything of it. But he tested in typical fashion for him – very diligent and not getting too distracted by the occasion; he took it in his stride. I liked him a lot for the little time I spent around him."

The CART community didn't have much time to get a feel for Marcelo's capabilities in the three races he contested with Euromotorsport prior to Indianapolis. Saddled with a year-old Lola chassis powered by an uncompetitive Cosworth engine, Marcelo was never going to impress against the Andrettis, Unsers, and other legends in the series. Through the first three rounds of the championship, Marcelo barely cracked the top 20 at Surfers Paradise, Phoenix or Long Beach, but was looking forward to his first appearance at Indy.

Driving the No. 50 entry, Marcelo made it through Rookie Orientation, but the old Lola wasn't performing up to expectations once official practice began on May 2. During an era where the entire month was used for practice and qualifying was completed over two weekends, the Euromotorsport team realized it had no hope of running for the pole and formed a plan to continue practicing and searching for speed while aiming to qualify during the second weekend.



Marcelo would watch as Roberto Guerrero used the mighty Buick V6 turbo to score pole over the first weekend at an average of 232.4 mph, and when practice resumed on Monday, May 11, the challenge ahead was magnified when the Euromotorsport entry struggled to surpass the 215 mph range. More practice laps would be required to coax speed out of the recalcitrant No. 50.

On Thursday the 14th, Marcelo would raise his speed to 216.8 mph, and with one day left before the final weekend of qualifying to reach an average of 220 mph – the minimum speed most felt would be needed to make the field of 33 – the pressure was on.

To give Marcelo his best chance of earning a spot on the grid, the Euromotorsport team installed a fresh engine to use for the weekend, but it also meant the car spent most of Friday the 15th in the garage. Marcelo and the team finally ventured out at 3:48 p.m. to test the engine and try some simulated qualifying runs. Nineteen minutes later, he was gone.

The IMS TV cameras only managed to catch the tail-end of Marcelo's crash entering Turn 1, but reports had him getting low into the corner, which caused the car to break free and rocket toward the wall. The No. 50 hit nose-first before ricocheting and continuing around toward Turn 2, where Marcelo came to a stop.

The crash was undoubtedly violent, but looked like countless others where drivers emerged alive and intact. Yet Marcelo was pronounced dead at Methodist Hospital at 4:35 p.m.

IMS Medical Director Dr. Henry Bock offered a succinct answer on the physical cause of Marcelo's death: "Blunt force head injury caused by the crash. There were no other injuries. After examining Marcelo's helmet and uniform, there are no marks or damage indicating Jovy was hit by a tire, suspension piece or any other member of his car."

Marcelo died five days short of his 27th birthday, leaving behind his pregnant wife Irene and five-year-old son Karsten. His death on May 15 also coincided with the 10-year anniversary of Gordon Smiley's horrific loss at the Speedway in 1982.

The exact root of the basal skull fracture that took Marcelo's life was never sufficiently proven. Although its widespread adoption would come a decade after his crash, the use of the HANS device would eventually and greatly reduce the number of basal skull-related racing deaths.

Marcelo's father, Edward, proved to be one of the more remarkable figures in the sport after losing his son. Rather than retreat and grieve in private, he was a visible figure afterward and continued to support Indy car racing by providing associate sponsorship for the Euromotorsport team through the mid-1990s (BELOW: Davy Jones in a Marcelo-backed Euromotorsport Lola at Indy in 1993).



"Jovy would want the public to know that it was his dream to drive in the Indianapolis 500," he said after his son's fatal crash. "More than himself, he wanted to represent his home country and all the race drivers in the Philippines. He expressed to me that he considered the Indy car community as one big family, a family he was very proud to be part of."

Marcelo's death also affected the entire Vasser family – at the track and from afar.

"It was a very tough time for me, being a rookie and a young guy," said Vasser. "The one guy that I was kind of coming up with got killed at Indy... It was tough on my family as well. There was a point there where they really didn't want me to keep doing it after Jovy died. It was tough on my dad because there was some confusion when it happened. There was a news report in the Bay Area, and Jovy lived in Hillsborough (about 15 minutes south from Vasser's San Francisco home). My dad wasn't at Indy, but he heard on the radio, 'Local rookie killed at Indy' and he freaked out because he thought it was me. It was a real tough time for him.

"Then I went on to break my legs in the race, so there was a time there the rest of my family wasn't real happy about me being a driver. Not to mention all the crashes that happened in 1992. I broke my leg, Jovy got killed, and a lot of other guys got hurt – Jeff Andretti was in a terrible way, with his feet, (almost) finished his career. '92 was a really tough year in that way."

Marcelo didn't get the chance to mature as an Indy car driver, to sample better equipment, or to produce the results many believe he was capable of delivering.

"He won [Atlantic] races on the road courses and the ovals and he stepped it up," Vasser said. "How far he would've gotten in his career, I don't know. But he certainly was talented enough to have the opportunity to be in the position he was in. A lot of moving forward has to do with having the right type of package; there were a lot of guys who are talented that I'd see growing up in the lower formulas that didn't really get the chance to move on who probably deserved to be there. Jovy deserved to have a better chance at Indy car than he got."

[Rad-oh-yeah?]

Takodje, danas je 35 godina od pogibije Gordona Smajlija na Indijanapolisu.

 

 

 

Smajli je bio iskusan trkac na "redovnim" stazama ali novajlija za ovale, i njegov udes je ekstreman primer kako na Indiju stvari mogu da podju naopako za nekog ko nije odrastao na ovalima. Naime, da bi se na Indiju odvezao dobar brz krug u kvalifikacijama bolid mora kroz krivine da ide u konstantnom malom driftu, ali ako se prekardasi sa driftovanjem gubi se zadnji kraj i zavrsava se u zidu. Iskuski vozaci znaju da ako zadnjica bolida krene da pretice prednjicu tu spasa vise nema, i obicno puste bolid da se okrene i zadnjim krajem udari u zid. Nasuprot njima, instinkt vozaca sa "redovnih" staza je da mota kontru i spasava okretanje - iz cistog razloga jer se njima to cesce desava, ali pri mnogo manjim brzinama, i ne sa zidom tik uz ivicu staze. Ovo ponekad radi, ali najcesce se desi da prednji tockovi "ujedu" asfalt, okrenu bolid licem na zid i od teskog udesa po bolid ali ne i po vozaca naprave totalnu katastrofu.

 

Pored Smajlija slicno iskustvo je imao i Nelson Pike, ali na srecu stradale su samo noge mada je i u njegovom udesu udarac bio toliko jak da je doslo do kontakta izmedju kacige i zida:

 

 

Ovo su lekcije koje Alonso mora da nauci tokom Meseca Maja, da mora da iskljuci svoje prirodne instinkte i prilagodi stil voznje. Danas su umesto golog betona svuda oko Indija instalirani SAFER zidovi a i bolidi su mnogo cvrsci i bezbedniji nego u Smajlijevo i Pikeovo vreme tako da bi i posledice ovakvog udesa danas bile mnogo manje, ali nijedan vozac pa cak ni kalibra Alonsa sebi ni za jedan trenutak ne sme da dozvoli da potceni Indi i da se opusti...

[Rad-oh-yeah?]

[Rad-oh-yeah?]

Rear View: Goodyear's cruel '92 Indy 500 finish
Tuesday, 16 May 2017
By Marshall Pruett / Images by IMS Photo & Marshall Pruett
It took many years for Scott Goodyear to fully appreciate his role in producing the closest finish in Indy 500 history.

The 1992 runner-up, forever remembered for coming home 0.043 seconds behind Al Unser Jr., was too busy in the cockpit of his Walker Racing Lola-Chevy to understand that ABC's "Wide World of Sports" intro – the famed "Thrill of victory and the agony of defeat"– had come to life in the sprint to the finish line.

"At the time, I couldn't understand all the fuss, that everybody was thinking how cool it was back then," Goodyear said ahead of the race's 25th anniversary. "It was just non-stop ... I finished second. I lost. Like, why is everybody excited about this? I couldn't grasp hold of that."

Going through the near-win process on two more occasions actually helped the genial Canadian to reconcile the 1992 finish. He was leading, moments from victory in 1995 when he passed the pace car on a restart and was later disqualified for failing to serve a penalty for the infraction. And in 1997, in a similar situation to 1992, he was dealt another cruel blow when his teammate Arie Luyendyk made a late pass for the win in 1997.



"And then many different scenarios happened over time to actually make me realize that, 'Hey, this is OK; this is pretty cool,'" he said. "I say that and I walk in tonight and I'm going for mail and opening some fan mail stuff that sits here. And there's stuff in there from 1992, the closest finish. There always is.

"To this day I still get 50 percent of fan mail for 1992, so that's incredible. For me, it absolutely has turned into being a life-changing moment. I guess it's become a little bit of my legacy in the sense of being second a couple times. Well, between '92 and '95 and '97."

If there's one truly amazing aspect to consider with Goodyear's prowess at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, it's this: The 1992 Indy 500 was the 12th oval race of his career.

Trained in the art of road racing at home and in the United States, Goodyear honed his craft in the SCCA Formula Atlantic series – a precursor to today's Indy Lights championship – where he won the Eastern division championship in 1986. Unlike the rival SCCA Super Vee series, Atlantics shied away from ovals, which left Goodyear as an IndyCar hopeful with a big hole in his open-wheel development.

In a scenario identical to what Spencer Pigot has today with Ed Carpenter Racing, Goodyear entered the CART IndyCar series in 1987 as a part-time road and street course specialist. It wasn't until his first full season in 1990 that learning the art of oval driving was offered.

"I started racing ovals when I got to Indy cars," he said. "My first real oval experience was in an Indy car at Phoenix."

There was nothing to suggest Goodyear was destined for oval greatness at the end of his first test with O'Donnell Racing, a satellite team to Arie Luyendyk's Shierson Racing program, but he did learn one invaluable item before flying home.

"So after the first day I thought [I was doing OK]; I didn't know how far away I was from Arie, probably a half-second," he said. "I clearly remember the next day I got out and it was probably past 10 o'clock in the morning. I had understeer at [Turn] 1 and 2 and tried to cowboy the thing around. Promptly had the back end step out from underneath me and I busted into a wall and knocked myself out and made the car so it wasn't running anymore for the day.

"After that I thought, 'I am going to understand what these oval cars need, because I clearly can't overdrive it.' And really just started to program it. I tried to learn how to make these things work."

Known for his intelligence and fastidious ways, Goodyear treated oval driving like a problem to solve and found most of the answers that were missing at the Phoenix test. He'd return for the 1990 season opener at the one-mile oval and finish an impressive 10th.

Goodyear's second oval race – the Indy 500 – delivered another 10th-place finish. In fact, he finished 10th at each of the five ovals in the calendar that year using a year-old Lola chassis and second-tier Judd engines. Although Unser Jr. had grown up racing on ovals and carried vast experience into the 1992 showdown, it's fair to say Goodyear was something of an oval prodigy. A lack of oval mileage was the only thing his natural talent could not overcome leading up to lap 200.

"You know, Indy in '92, I had been to how many ovals in that time? Probably 12 in my life," he said. "And Al Jr. doing all his stuff in Super Vee and ovals. I think his [Indy 500] rookie year there was in 1983. So clearly, I didn't have the experience to be able to compete with Unser and Unser legacy – and especially Al Jr.



"I look back on the race now, [and] I don't want to say I didn't know what I was doing, but I didn't have the experience to know exactly where to place my car. Because I wasn't placing my car in the right spot, or setting it up well or didn't do all the things I learned to do a couple years later."

Goodyear's inexperience was exposed well before the final lap in 1992. With Michael Andretti running away with the race, Unser Jr. and Goodyear were left to fight over second place and swapped positions on a regular basis late in the race. Based on what he expected to take place with Andretti driving into Victory Lane, and the routine passing and repassing with Unser Jr., Goodyear made one mistake that would cost him dearly.


 
"A couple things come to mind about that and it was getting caught at Turn 2 with a slow-moving car that a little off pace, unfortunately," he said. "And I ended up having to move down a couple gears to try to get back up to speed coming to Turn 2, [and] I knew that Al had a run on me. This was when Michael was still in the lead.

"And I was second at that time and I thought you know, how wide can I make the car? And all sorts of things go through your head and you know I start moving the car, watching the mirrors. He had a good run on me so I decide i can't do that. You let him go by. Because at that point and time you say OK, I will come back and get him."

When Andretti's car coasted to a halt on lap 189 and Unser Jr. inherited the lead, the folly of Goodyear's friendly decision was confirmed.

"At that time, we are running second now, moving into third," he said. "And then lo and behold however many laps it was later then Michael breaks down and now we are in second instead of first. So, I looked back at that in my very much rookie mode of driving ovals and think, 'Well, that wasn't very brilliant of me or very smart.' Not that I think I would have done anything different today."

As Unser Jr.'s blue and white Galles/KRACO Racing Galmer G92 spooled up its Chevy turbo V8 for the lap 194 restart, Goodyear's blue and silver Walker Racing Lola T92/00-Chevy was in the unenviable position of having to chase a driver with a family tradition to uphold.

The two protagonists fought and weaved throughout the final laps, and despite setting the record for the closest finish, Goodyear says there was never any doubt about who crossed the yard of bricks first.

"I clearly knew that I wasn't even past the start/finish line, because back then you could really see all the bricks when you went across them," he said.

Finally, by 2006, and while serving as a commentator for ABC, Goodyear was able to fully understand what Indy 500 fans felt and saw in 1992. High atop the front straight, looking down from a similar angle as the cameras that caught his drag race with Unser Jr., Goodyear was moved by Sam Hornish's 0.0635-second win over Marco Andretti.

"It took that long before I really understood exactly what everybody saw in 1992," he acknowledged. "I couldn't see it as a driver. Because to me, I still lost. I finished second."



It's hard to ignore the lingering tone of sorrow when Goodyear speaks of his Indy 500 experiences. Getting over the runner-up finishes is one thing. Coming to terms with the fact that he never won is an entirely different realization. It involves overcoming remorse for missing out on a destiny he believes he was meant to fulfill.

The sting of three crushing losses have faded over the last three decades, but there's still a sense Goodyear is searching for the acceptance – or possibly forgiveness – for what transpired at Indy.

"We are still in the same house here in Indianapolis and we had it built by the same builder that Josie George used," he said. "In my office, I had them build shelves that were specifically in my mind just the right size for the Borg-Warner Trophy, [the] Baby Borg. Because in my mind I was going to win the thing. I just felt that. That was the reason I was put here.

"You get to a point when you are racing, that even after '95 with a disqualification, I know how to make the car go fast here, I know what it needs. I know how to work on the car. I can read traffic, I know other conditions, I know how to make the thing go to what I need to go. I felt confident as a driver that I was going to come back and have more opportunities."

Goodyear would retire after making four more attempts to win the Indy 500. An unfulfilling one-off with Team Cheever in 2001 closed the books on an amazing career that has been defined more for what didn't happen than all of the incredible things he achieved.

"You step away from it because you are getting too old and all that sort of stuff. And with me, being crashed out with my second broken back, I knew I was done," he said. "But it is what it is. As you get older, maybe it doesn't bother you as much and as life changes other things become important, I guess."

Twenty-five years on, the magnitude of Goodyear's 1992 performance continues to resonate with casual fans in his everyday life. Each reminder has provided a chance to speak with grace and humility.

"And you know the funniest thing that happened?" he said. "I will still go have lunches and meet people in business and things like that. They will sit there and they will look dead honest when they say this, because you know you can read the people well.

"And they go, 'Yeah, and what year did you win Indy again?' People just think because you are so close, or whatever the deal was, that you have won it. And some people go, 'Yeah, did you win it once or twice?' Because they were there or what have you.

"It's just the funniest thing. And sometimes you look at people and you go, no, no, no. You have to sort of correct them on it. It's the weirdest thing, honestly. I kind of chuckle about it sometimes."

Humor, as Goodyear confides, has been his chosen form of coping with Indy's heartless outcomes.

"Later that year in '92, the guy came from Sports Illustrated to do an article and at that time I had the [finish line] picture turned upside down in my office behind my head. So, the guy came and we talked all day," he said.

"We went for lunch and came back and chatted some more. And then he said, 'Just before I go, I have to ask you one question if you don't mind.' I said, 'Sure, what is that?' He goes, 'Do you know the photo is upside down on your wall?'



"I turned around and looked at it and I looked back at him and I go, 'Yeah, I do.' And he goes, 'Well, why is that?' And I go, that's because the blue and silver car is leading the blue and white car. And he broke out laughing. He goes, 'Really?' I said, 'Yeah.'"

Edited by Rad-oh-yeah?, 18 May 2017 - 15:19.

[Rad-oh-yeah?]

Mears' 1992 Indy farewell
Thursday, 18 May 2017
By Marshall Pruett / Images by IMS Photo


Rick Mears didn't know the 1992 Indy 500 would be his last.

The Rocket, an oval legend seemingly made from the same bricks and asphalt that form the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, walked away from his spiritual home a quarter century ago. And crucially, he did so on his own terms. The circumstances and thought processes behind his decision to retire are nothing less than fascinating.

Mears used his otherworldly physical skills to keep cars dancing on the edge around the Speedway, and outside the car, his innate curiosity pushed Penske Racing through new technological boundaries. With that same analytical mind churning during the latter stages of his career, Mears looked inward – probed and question his motives for wanting to continue after winning four Indy 500s in 12 years.

And then 1992 happened. A bone-breaking crash in practice – a definite aberration for Mears at Indy – and another crash in the race would lead the native of Bakersfield, California to reconsider his need for life at the limit.



Twenty-five years after his last 500 start, Mears expressed mixed emotions on the anniversary's arrival.

"It would've been nicer to end on a better note," he said. "But one thing about it, I guess one reason I don't have a lot of feelings one way or the other about it is because at the time I didn't realize it was the last one. And I still hadn't made a decision. I'd been kicking it around a little bit for the past couple of years off and on. It crossed my mind, how much longer am I going to do this? And I'd realize the desire is tapering off so I was keeping tabs on that. That was the first indicator."

If we could rewrite the Rocket's history, he would have left clean in 1991 after winning his fourth 500. That's the perfect memory of Mears – untouchable – as he waged an almighty war with Michael Andretti in the final laps of the race. In every possible way, Indy 1992 simple doesn't fit the Mears narrative, and yet it's where his story ended at the Speedway. Nagging issues with his broken wrist and fractures to his feet from Indy ensured the end was near.

"And then after Indy we were into the season and I had the wrist problems lingering from the crash," he said. We thought it was sprained, but it was actually some torn ligaments and fractures."

If Mears' Indy crash looked frightening, just imagine the scary scene taking place inside the cockpit of his Penske chassis on the Michigan superspeedway with one fully functional arm.

"The car went dead loose and we couldn't fix it, it just kept getting loose," he said of the 220mph oval. "Tightened it up on the [pit] stop and go back out and it would get looser faster and it kept jumping sideways. I would have to turn loose with my right hand to catch it because I couldn't roll my hand under the wheel because of the splint on my wrist.

"And so it was jumping sideways and I was having to turn loose with one hand and catch it with one hand and then come back and grab the wheel again and kept doing that. Finally, I said I'm going to take me and somebody with me. This is not good. And I ended up parking the car."

The hat trick of absurdity was the catalyst for Mears' eventual career change. Being one-handed, while racing on a dangerous oval, all at terrifying speeds, was just too much to accept.

"So I got out of the car and I talked to the doctors and said, we have to do something about the wrists, they're not getting better. We got some X-rays and took a look at it and we saw there was more damage and I was going to have surgery. Now I'm going to miss the next couple of races. That is when I got to thinking about it," he said.



"Finally, one day I woke up, [and] there was just another indicator of desire. [I'd] never parked the car that was still running before. Only one other time in my life can I recall that I parked the car while it was still running, was when I got the rock in my eye at the Meadowlands and I couldn't see out of my left eye. I ran about four or five laps and I couldn't see left and I was afraid somebody was going to dive in between me and the concrete wall and those hallways. And I was going to end up taking us out. I ended up parking the car because of that. You get home, no matter what it takes."

Drivers young and old – especially when they're in their prime – don't dwell on the crashes they've had. It's a defense mechanism. Keeping the bad thoughts at bay keeps the inner fire raging, and at Michigan, Mears found himself caught in a flashback to May and the jarring accident in practice.

"I get out of the car, and then another thought crossed my mind that I thought when I crashed when I got upside down when the water line broke. And I had never thought of it. It went through my mind during a crash and then it went out of my mind. I never really even thought about it again until [Michigan]," he said.

"And I remember when I crashed, I got upside down, I'm sliding along upside down, feet and legs are killing me, I've got fluid running in and I'm starting to breathe shallow so I have a breath in case it ignites, because I can't unbuckle my belt until it comes to a stop. So if it ignites, I'm going to have to hold my breath until I come to a stop and climb out.



"So I'm sliding along there and I'm breathing shallow, stuff coming in, watching the sparks fly in the infield go by and the wall go by and the infield go by and the wall go by, and I remember the thought just flashed through my mind: I don't need this s***. I swear to God. And by the time I got to a stop, it just flashed in my mind: I don't need this s***.

"And then it was on to holding my breath and watching for sparks and hope it doesn't ignite, the fuel, the water. Came to a stop and it didn't light so it was water, I could relax and wait 'til they get to me. And then got out of the car. And I went on through the rest of the month."

It was while recovering from additional surgery to mend the items that caused so many problems at Michigan when Mears knew it was time to step away from his life's passion.

"I was laid up and I woke up one morning I thought, you idiot," he said. "If you're thinking about [the Indy crash], it's past the time. It is past time if you are thinking about it this hard. That's when I decided, you know, it is time to go ... if the desire is not there, you're not going to do the job the way it needs to be done. You won't get the fifth [Indy] win anyway. And that's not fair to the team."

[Rad-oh-yeah?]

MILLER: F1 champions at the Speedway
Thursday, 18 May 2017
Robin Miller / Images by IMS & LAT Archive


Fernando Alonso is the 15th world champion to take on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, and he's got history on his side. Formula 1's elite has fared well at 16th & Georgetown.

Jim Clark, Graham Hill, Mario Andretti, Emerson Fittipaldi and Jacques Villeneuve all made it to Victory Lane, while Jackie Stewart and Nigel Mansell came oh-so-close: F1 drivers in general have adapted quickly to the speed, the walls and turning left all day.

Andretti had already become a household name in the USA and Indy winner (1969, ABOVE) when he scored his F1 title in 1978, but he's got a theory as to why those great road racers do so well on ovals.

"It's a lot easier to adapt to ovals than road racing," said Andretti, who watched teammate Mansell win four times on ovals in his rookie season. "There's so much more work to do in road racing, you have to figure out gearing and braking and technique.

"And good road racers are use to high-speed corners – and Indianapolis has four of them."



Of course, it didn't start out so promisingly when Alberto Ascari, Giuseppe Farina and Juan Manuel Fangio led the first wave in the 1950s. Ascari came to Indianapolis as a 44-year-old rookie in 1952, the same year he would win the first of his back-to-back championships with Ferrari – which itself mounted a four-car assault at the Speedway. It was supposed to be five, but 1950 titlist Farina had crashed his car a few weeks before competing in the non-championship Valentino Grand Prix in Turin, Italy.

The bright red Ferraris were assigned to 1950 Indy winner Johnnie Parsons, Bobby Ball and Johnny Mauro, but only Ascari made the show after J.P. bailed early in the month when he realized that the car wasn't up to snuff. Walt Faulkner took over Parsons' ride and instantly said: "This car has no chance of winning," before quitting.

But, despite the fact the Ferrari sported a four-speed gearbox (compared to two for everyone else in Gasoline Alley), was woefully shy of low-end torque and was excessively heavy, Ascari qualified 19th. He got up as high as eighth in the race before a wheel failed and he spun out, eventually being awarded 31st place.

Farina was 49 when he returned in 1955 and passed his rookie test, but didn't qualify. He returned in 1956 but was again was unsuccessful because his engine didn't have the ponies.

The most anticipated rookie was Fangio, the five-time world champion who came to the Speedway in 1958 at the age of 46. As the story goes, he was goaded into coming to IMS by Floyd Clymer, whose Indy 500 yearbooks became legendary. Clymer was miffed because Fangio chose not to participate in the 1957 War of the Worlds at Monza, which pitted American IndyCar drivers against F1 pilots.



Clymer reportedly offered Fangio a $9,000 carrot – $500 for entering, $1,000 if he qualified, $2,500 if he ran in the Top 5 in an American car and $5,000 if he ran in the Top 5 in a foreign-built car. Fangio accepted, and said he would donate whatever he won to charity.

Wheeling George Walther's Kurtis/Offy, Fangio breezed through his rookie test, survived a quick spin and reached 142 mph (it took 142.5 to qualify that May) in practice before abruptly leaving. According to a story in The Indianapolis News, Fangio felt "the car is not in the optimum condition to permit him to uphold his reputation as a word champion race driver". He also cited complications involving a fuel contract.

Two months later, The Maestro retired from competition.

In 1961, Jack Brabham (coming off back-to-back F1 championships in 1959-60) created some mild amusement among the Gasoline Alley regulars when he qualified an under-horsepowered but smooth-handling rear-engined Cooper and finished ninth.

Two years later, Colin Chapman, Lotus, Ford, Clark and Gurney descended upon the Speedway and began digging the grave for the front-engine roadsters. Clark was second in '63, on the pole in '64 and put the Lotus/Ford in the Winner's Circle in '65 – followed by Hill's triumph in 1966 in a rear-engine Lola/Ford. Stewart was leading with nine laps to go when his Lola/Ford lost oil pressure.

Fittipaldi, a two-time F1 champion, had retired following his dismal years with Copersucar, made a comeback at age 39 in CART race in 1984, and captured the Michigan 500 in only his seventh start on an oval in '85.

"I listened to Bill Vukovich on the radio as a boy and I never imagined I'd run at Indianapolis some day, but there was something about ovals that fit my style," said Fittipaldi, who earned his initial Indy victory in a stirring, slam-bang duel to the finish with Al Unser Jr. in 1989. Emmo won again in 1993, but only because '92 world champ Mansell didn't have much experience at restarting on ovals and got snookered.



"It was my fault, I didn't get an early enough jump and those two (Fittipaldi and Arie Luyendyk) just blew right by, so it's on me," said Mansell (RIGHT), who led 34 laps and was comfortably out in front before a caution set up his fateful restart with 15 laps remaining.

Mansell, who turned his back on F1 to join Newman/Haas full-time for the 1993 CART campaign, took the title on the strength of his four oval-track wins at Milwaukee, Michigan, Loudon and Nazareth. Fittipaldi also dominated the '94 race (leading 145 laps) and was trying to lap second place when he crashed on Lap 185.

Meanwhile, one of Mansell's Formula 1 sparring partners attempted to take that rivalry across to the Speedway when three-time world champion Nelson Piquet turned up to race at the 500 in 1992 with Menard. His speed was good, but that didn't count for much when he jumped out of the throttle exiting Turn 4 and crashed into the wall. He returned in 1993 and qualified 13th, but dropped out early on with an engine problem.

In 1995, second-generation star Villeneuve (BELOW) came from two laps down to put his face on the Borg-Warner Trophy and claimed the CART crown that same season before heading to F1 where he won the world championship in 1997.

Juan Pablo Montoya, who won the CART title in 1999 and 2000 Indy 500 before heading to F1 where he won seven grands prix, believes the latest F1 champ will adapt to the hype, close running and insane restarts.

"Fernando is very talented and smart," said Montoya, a now-two-time Indy winner who is back this month looking for number three. "He'll be just fine."

[Rad-oh-yeah?]

Ode jos jedan velikan...
 

Jim McElreath 1928-2017
Thursday, 18 May 2017
By Robin Miller / Images by IMS Photo

Above: Jim McElreath, 1980. McElreath made 15 Indy 500 starts.

Jim McElreath, who started his Indianapolis 500 career as rookie of the year in a roadster back in 1962 and finished it 20 years later in the ground-effects era as his own chief mechanic, passed away Thursday at the age of 89.

In a life spiced with racing successes and personal tragedies, McElreath was thought of as one of the toughest drivers – mentally and physically – ever to buckle up a helmet.

The man who cut his teeth on IMCA sprint cars captured the inaugural California 500 at Ontario, scored four other IndyCar wins and finished second and third in the USAC national championship in addition to being a fierce competitor in dirt cars.

"He was a helluva lot better than people thought he was," said A.J. Foyt, who owned McElreath's winning car at Ontario. "He was hard to beat; he was tough but he was a good guy."


McElreath's first Indy 500 start, 1962

Three-time Indy 500 winner Johnny Rutherford went one better in his praise. "If Jim had equal equipment to A.J. he'd have given him all he wanted," said Lone Star J.R. "He was really good in a champ dirt car too.

"Not sure the general public knew much about Jim, but all the guys that raced with him knew how good he was."

McElreath wasn't much for small talk and didn't suffer fools – or people messing with his livelihood.

"Jim didn't talk much but if he or Rube [Lloyd Ruby] stood up in a drivers meeting we all shut up," Bobby Unser said with a laugh. "He was a nice man but you didn't want to get Jim mad at you."

But the Arlington, Texas native's off-track life was full of sorrow.

His son, James, was killed in a sprint car in 1977 at Winchester, and on Valentine's Day 2000 his daughter, Shirley Ann, lost her life in a private airplane crash with her husband, Tony Bettenhausen Jr., and two other friends.

Shortly after his daughter's death, Jim's wife Shirley suffered a debilitating stroke that affected her speech and left her in a wheelchair, where she remains today.

During the last few years McElreath's health deteriorated to the point where he could no longer take care of his wife and required constant care himself.

"Jim was as tough and strong as they made 'em but James' death really hit home and he literally cried on my shoulder," recalled Rutherford, who came up through the IMCA ranks under McElreath's guidance.

But McElreath kept racing, even though it was quickly becoming a rich man's sport. He bought an old Penske chassis in 1980, worked on it himself and qualified 11th for his 15th and final start at IMS. His best finishes were third in 1966 and fifth in 1970 – driving for Foyt.

If the deaths of his two children weren't enough, his wife's stroke turned him into a permanent caregiver. He never left her side the past 17 years.

Foyt said it best: “Jimmy was a helluva man.”

[Rad-oh-yeah?]

Pre neki dan smo culi Skot Gudjirovu verziju price o Indiju 1992, evo sada iz perspektive "malog" Ala:
 

Rear View: Little Al's best day - 1992 Indy 500
Saturday, 20 May 2017
By Marshall Pruett / Images by IMS Photo


Maybe attempt number 25 will be successful. We'll have to wait until May 28 to find out if 1992's closest finish in Indy 500 history can be broken. Whether Al Unser Jr's 0.043-second win over Scott Goodyear stands or falls, Little A says their bond – formed while charging to the finish line – will remain.

"It's been a true blessing," said the two-time Indy winner. "Scott Goodyear, he's a very good man. He's one hell of a competitor. Because of our connection with the 500 in 1992, since then I've got to know him, we've gone out and stuff, and he's told me about his struggles and tribulations on how he actually got to the Indy 500. The things that he had to do as a kid and a young racecar driver coming up. Man, he worked his ass off to get there."
 


In an odd continuation of the good fortune his father, four-time Indy 500 winner Al Unser, experienced in 1987 when Mario Andretti dominated the race but broke in the latter stages of the 200-lap event, Little Al was the beneficiary of Michael Andretti's misfortune at the 1992 Indy event.

As one father coasted to a stop and handed the 1987 win to the other father, one son – on a path of destruction five years later – coasted to a halt, which allowed the other son to earn his first 500 victory. Andretti to Unser, Andretti to Unser Jr; it was a remarkably familiar result.

Shared in a recent interview with Little Al, the dramatic turn of events in 1992 with Andretti's mechanical woes, the frigid weather, countless crashes, and the amazing duel with Goodyear make for a joyful trip back to his best day in the sport.

[Rad-oh-yeah?]

[Rad-oh-yeah?]

Rear View: Jeff Andretti's life-changing 1992 500
Monday, 22 May 2017
By Marshall Pruett / Images by IMS Photo


Jeff Andretti's life was changed forever at the 1992 Indy 500. Mario's youngest son, making his third start at the Speedway, suffered troubling injuries in a Turn 2 crash that flattened the front of his A.J. Foyt Racing Lola-Chevy.

With badly broken feet and ankles to free from the tattered, shortened chassis, it took 18 excruciating minutes to remove Andretti from the car and clean up the debris field. Remembered for unreasonably high number of crashes – 13 in total – caused in part by the frigid temperatures, Andretti's accident was the heavy counterweight that balanced the cheer and celebration that came with Al Unser Jr.'s first Indy 500 win.

"Well, to look back to that day and stuff, it just was a dark day for motorsports," Andretti said of the 25-year-old race. "It was bright for one individual and it was dark for a lot of others. But it's one of those years where, I guess you could say we learned a lot about safety with our cars. We knew that, obviously, there was an issue that we were overlooking as far as safety of the car."

A lot of drivers spun and crashed, including Jeff's father, but his accident was due to a mechanical failure. While it might not matter, considering the end result and physical damage that followed, at least Andretti knows his life-altering incident wasn't because he made a driving mistake.



"Yeah, we had a hub cage crack and come apart and the wheel just came completely off the car on entry to [Turn] 2," he said. "But, things happen. Parts break on cars, those are things that you can't foresee, they just happen. Again, that comes down to the danger that we accept in the sport, that stuff's going to break. Unfortunately, I was on the rear end of that stick, where the hubs broke on me, and I guess it writes itself after that."

Carbon fiber tubs were a vast improvement for driver safety in the early 1990s, but it took crashes like Andretti's to reinforce the need for rapid advancements in frontal impact resistance.

"The front of the cars were not as safe as we probably could have had them," he continued. "But, again, it's one of those things where, in those days, we were all about trying to keep the cars light and aerodynamic and everything. So they were getting away from the safety aspect of the cars and not even thinking about it because things weren't happening."

Searching for the only positive from the crash, Andretti says his pain helped – in small part – to advance the state of the art with open-wheel tub design.

"All of a sudden '92 happens and we got the feet injuries," he added. "Again, I try to put a positive spin on a negative. The good that came out of it is the fact that we changed the cars and made the cars safer, so other drivers don't ever have to experience what we've gone through."

The severity of Andretti's crash was enough to question whether he'd return to the cockpit. Of all the achievements in his somewhat brief career, fighting through the agony of rehabilitation allowed Andretti to make the Indy 500 grid in 1993.

"Oh yeah, I mean I worked my butt off to get back into the seat again," he said. "The first thing out of my mouth to Dr. Trammel was, 'Am I going to walk again?' 'Yes.' The next thing out of my mouth is, 'Well, when can I get back in the seat?' He said, 'Well, it's up to you.' When he said it's up to me, guess what? I accepted the challenge and I challenged myself and found I actually had an inner strength that I didn't even know I had. I fought really long and hard, and was able to come back to the speedway and be able to compete again at the level that I needed to."

Three-time Formula 1 world champion Nelson Piquet was the first to record the kind of crash that Andretti encountered in 1992. The Brazilian's accident came earlier in the month during practice, and with an uncommon bond bringing them together, Andretti was able to inspire his rival to make the same comeback in 1993.

"The cool part about that was I was able to get Nelson Piquet to come back too," he said. "Because him and I got hurt the same year, and I, in some way, gave him an extra push. Because he was going to call it quits in his career and I said, Absolutely not. I'm not going to have this three-time world champion call it quits over this, I said, 'You're going to come back to the speedway just like I am. We're going to compete here.' I'll be darned if we didn't do it. We sat down after the race and said, 'Yeah we did, didn't we? Yep, we managed to do it.'"

Andretti started 16th and finished 29th in his final 500 appearance, and went on to race sports cars and stock cars before hanging up his helmet at the end of the decade. He's stayed close to racing with driving education and racing-related marketing and youth education initiatives taking up most of his time these days.



"We've created an online streaming television program called Andretti's FASTTRACK TV that's tied to S.T.E.A.M. education curriculum, that's actually used in the classroom around the country," he said. "We're going to start with middle-schoolers, but then we're going to be able to focus on high-school kids, middle-school kids, even down to the elementary level."

His IndyCar career was cut short, but you won't find a hint of bitterness in his voice when he recounts the 1992 Indy 500. Like the rest of his family, Jeff Andretti lives to fight.

"It just shows you that determination does pay off," he said. "If [there's] any message I could send to people, it's perseverance does pay off."

[Rad-oh-yeah?]

How the Indy 500 has changed motor racing and the car industry
3:54 AM ET
Nate SaundersF1 Assistant Editor
 

Fernando Alonso has caused a wave of excitement about the Indy 500, but the event has been influencing motor racing and the car industry for over 100 years. ESPN takes a look at the iconic oval race's best -- and most important -- innovations.

Rear-view mirrors

The first time a rear-view mirror was placed on a racing car was by Ray Harroun at the inaugural Indianapolis 500 in 1911. Harroun did so as a response to criticisms that he had entered a single-seater, rather than a car with space for a co-pilot riding alongside the driver. Rivals complained he would have an aerodynamic and weight advantage, adding that the lack of a co-pilot meant he would be blind to racers closing in behind.
His solution? Mounting a 3-by-8-inch rear-view mirror to his Marmon Wasp, inspired by seeing a similar contraption on a horse-drawn vehicle in Chicago six years earlier. Though he later described the mirror as useless due to the heavy vibrations in the car, Harroun won the event, and the rear-view mirror was a popular car accessory by the end of the decade.

Seatbelts

It seems crazy now, but there once was a time it was considered safer to be flung from a high-speed car than to risk being trapped inside one which could catch fire. That all changed at the 1922 Indy 500, when Barney Oldfield (the first man to drive a car at 60 mph) had a seatbelt placed inside his cockpit. Still worried about the danger of the event, Oldfield eventually opted against racing and instead drove the pace car. The idea did not catch on properly until 1956, when Ray Crawford opted for a car with a seatbelt and subsequently walked away from a head-on collision unscathed. Seatbelts became mandatory on U.S. road cars the following decade.

Four-wheel drive

To combat the slippery surface at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, car designer Harry Miller designed a vehicle which sent power to all four wheels of the car he debuted in 1932. In 1934, one of his cars led the race for several laps, but on the whole they remained slower than most two-wheeled car set-ups for several decades. The creation of four-wheel drive also saw Miller introduce four-wheel disc brakes later in the 1930s, something offered to American motorists shortly after the end of the war. Mario Andretti has previously said the Indy 500 is "100 per cent" responsible for creating the brake disc.

Alternative fuels

Though initially just for speed, the push for alternative fuels has had a big benefit on safety in motor racing. Ethanol was used to power an Indy 500 car in 1927, before one set a 10-year lap record in 1928. Teams continued to mix and match with fuels until a series of fiery crashes in the 1960s prompted the permanent switch to safer fuels. Today, IndyCars run on the 'E-85' fuel, which is 85 percent ethanol and just 15 percent gasoline.

Helmets

Helmets were made mandatory for every driver competing at the 1935 Indy 500, 17 years before the same rule was applied to European grand prix racing and the newly-formed F1 world championship.

Trackside lights

That same year, as part of a big push to improve Indy 500 safety, race organisers installed yellow and green lights around the circuit for the first time in a motor race to warn drivers about the status of the race track at any moment. This practice is now the norm in motor racing and has developed into state-of-the-art technology at every FIA-approved racing circuit in the world.

High-performance diesels

Diesel was never associated with racing events -- it was known for longevity and black smoke rather than sheer speed. That changed in 1931 when Clessie L. Cummins entered a diesel car to that year's Indy 500. Though it was hardly revolutionary in terms of speed, it ran the entire race without a pit stop and finished 13th. Five years later Mercedes had developed the first diesel road car.

Turbochargers

Formula One has taken turbocharged engines into a new era since introducing them in 2014, but it was a concept which made its debut at the 1952 Indy 500. Inspired by Second World War technology, the Cummins Diesel Special was the first to use the technology in Freddie Agabashian's car (a breakthrough for the high-performance diesels mentioned above). The turbo was both a blessing and a curse for Agabashian -- he romped to pole position for the event, but retired when tyre debris clogged up his engine, causing it to overheat.

Fireproof uniforms, roll bars

In 1959 Indianapolis Motor Speedway decided a big change was needed for safety. In 1958, Pat O'Connor had been killed when his car overturned and burst into flames. The following year, Jerry Unser -- the eldest brother of Bobby and Al and uncle of Al Jr -- died when his fuel tank punctured and his car caught fire. Fireproof overalls and anti-roll bar devices above the driver's heads became mandatory and both have been extensively developed and improved in the years since.

Crash data recorders

This one had a big impact on motor racing and the car industry. In 1993, IndyCar made it mandatory that every car competing at that year's Indy 500 had on-board crash data recorders. The hope was it would help better study and learn from accidents in the series. The idea quickly caught on in other racing series', including Formula One, and now it is commonplace for road cars to have similar devices onboard.

SAFER barriers

These energy-reduction barriers are now commonplace in motor racing and were developed at Indianapolis Motor Speedway in the late 1990s. They did not appear until the 2002 Indy 500 event but have since become commonplace at oval events. Though F1 has adopted different barriers for street and road courses, the general principal of the SAFER walls have helped change the philosophy behind such designs.