What a win percentage
- Thread starter Mike
- Start date
fluidfloyd
Active Member
I'm with you on that Dave. Just spec cars and engines that all look a like. I watched about 20 minutes of it at a fast food joint with TV screens everywhere. No sound but you could try to watch and read the running script. Pretty boring. Saw the crash at lap 165 so back to a caution flag so I dumped my trash and went back to work. At least as exciting as the race was.
George
Mike
Well-Known Member
George, I have a lot of fond memories of the Speedway, and I am not a very big fan of what that race has become in recent years.
I have an aunt who still lives just 2 blocks west of Georgetown Road, which parallels the front stretch. Her mother-in-law used to rent bedrooms to drivers and crews, who couldn't afford motel rates for the month. And a lot of pole winners and race winners rented rooms from the woman they all called 'Ma'. We would sit on my aunt's drive, doing the cookout thing, and listening to the race on the P.A. system.
Her brother (my uncle) was Fire Chief in Speedway for a time, and the pair of us used to walk Georgetown Road on the night before the race, to witness all the wild life.
In 1972 and '73, I worked evenings at a Mobil service station, located at the Speedway Shopping Center, on Crawfordsville Road. I went to work at 5:00 PM, the night before the '73 race, and worked until 7:00, the next morning. We had two, monstrous Coke machines, and I had an Out Of Order sign on one of them, because people kept coming in, throughout the night, giving me beer. I stripped all the sodas out of the machine and loaded it up with beer, to keep it all cold.
It took me about an hour, to drive 6 blocks east, to my uncle's house. From there, I was on foot carrying two, iced-down coolers, full of beer.
Bob Higman, who was one of the movers and shakers in Indiana open wheel racing, lived just south of here, in Romney, IN. Bob was part of the Jigger Sirois team that came 'this close' to qualifying on the pole for the 1969 500. That was a day we were happy to be sitting under the overhang, on the front stretch, as it was a miserable, rainy day. Bob was a friend, and his passing was one that was felt by a lot of open-wheel racers.
I remember Pole Day in 1967, sitting on the outside of the main stretch, watching history being made, as Parnelli Jones hustled the STP 'Whooshmobile' to the outside of row 2. And 1968, when Granatelli's turbines were Day-Glo red door-stops. Injected Fords, turbo-Offenhausers, and even the Novi helped me see that racing was the way forward for me.
I loved to go down there for Pole Day, but the only time I ever attended the race was in 1969, when Andretti won.
I really do miss the days when racers raced with their heads, and not their wallets.
I have an aunt who still lives just 2 blocks west of Georgetown Road, which parallels the front stretch. Her mother-in-law used to rent bedrooms to drivers and crews, who couldn't afford motel rates for the month. And a lot of pole winners and race winners rented rooms from the woman they all called 'Ma'. We would sit on my aunt's drive, doing the cookout thing, and listening to the race on the P.A. system.
Her brother (my uncle) was Fire Chief in Speedway for a time, and the pair of us used to walk Georgetown Road on the night before the race, to witness all the wild life.
In 1972 and '73, I worked evenings at a Mobil service station, located at the Speedway Shopping Center, on Crawfordsville Road. I went to work at 5:00 PM, the night before the '73 race, and worked until 7:00, the next morning. We had two, monstrous Coke machines, and I had an Out Of Order sign on one of them, because people kept coming in, throughout the night, giving me beer. I stripped all the sodas out of the machine and loaded it up with beer, to keep it all cold.
It took me about an hour, to drive 6 blocks east, to my uncle's house. From there, I was on foot carrying two, iced-down coolers, full of beer.Bob Higman, who was one of the movers and shakers in Indiana open wheel racing, lived just south of here, in Romney, IN. Bob was part of the Jigger Sirois team that came 'this close' to qualifying on the pole for the 1969 500. That was a day we were happy to be sitting under the overhang, on the front stretch, as it was a miserable, rainy day. Bob was a friend, and his passing was one that was felt by a lot of open-wheel racers.
I remember Pole Day in 1967, sitting on the outside of the main stretch, watching history being made, as Parnelli Jones hustled the STP 'Whooshmobile' to the outside of row 2. And 1968, when Granatelli's turbines were Day-Glo red door-stops. Injected Fords, turbo-Offenhausers, and even the Novi helped me see that racing was the way forward for me.
I loved to go down there for Pole Day, but the only time I ever attended the race was in 1969, when Andretti won.
I really do miss the days when racers raced with their heads, and not their wallets.
2old2fast
Active Member
Growing up as a mostly "straight line" race fan & participant , I never paid alot of attention to guys that 'went in circles" ...In 2002 ,a freind took me to a nascar race at Indy..... well ..HOLY S#$T.. these guys have got something goin' on !!! A couple years later we went to a " busch series" race at chicago land....they also ran Indy lites & the big boys the same evening.... tell you what guys , if you've never been to a race , TV doesn't do it justice , the sights , sounds & smells from a live race is REALLY impressive !!!
dave
dave
Mike
Well-Known Member
Dave, I've always said if a race car is going around a corner, the driver better have the chute/s out and be tugging on the brake handle. 
The company that coiled our valve springs also did nearly all the chassis springs for the Indy car teams. Each May, they would give us a day with their garage pins, so we would have the run of the track. I used to go stand on the inside of turn 1, and watch cars coming down that front stretch. That they would all make it around that corner seemed miraculous to me. And that they could do it was also a mystery to me. It's hard enough to make a car go fast in a straight line, so adding in corners seems pretty daunting.
The company that coiled our valve springs also did nearly all the chassis springs for the Indy car teams. Each May, they would give us a day with their garage pins, so we would have the run of the track. I used to go stand on the inside of turn 1, and watch cars coming down that front stretch. That they would all make it around that corner seemed miraculous to me. And that they could do it was also a mystery to me. It's hard enough to make a car go fast in a straight line, so adding in corners seems pretty daunting.
Don'tCallMeJimmie
Member
Pike's Peak is the same in a number of ways. Lots of cars are faster, like the twin-engine turbo'd Mitsubishi roller skate, whistling by at 110mph, but there's nothing like the open-wheel or stock car rounding "your" corner out of shape, wound up, and flingin' gravel to get you on your feet and the blood pumping.
The rest were just 'yeah, uhh, cool' if yuhnowhutuhmeen.
The rest were just 'yeah, uhh, cool' if yuhnowhutuhmeen.
I didn't realize Montoya only ran in three 500's. Then to win this one from 30th spot is even more amazing.
Safety has come a long way with some of the crashes and walking away basically uninjured. Still a dangerous sport and at those speeds they're laying it on the line.
Safety has come a long way with some of the crashes and walking away basically uninjured. Still a dangerous sport and at those speeds they're laying it on the line.
fluidfloyd
Active Member
Mike...I to prefer watching Indy cars back when they actually had some individuality to them. Now you can only tell the difference by the color or a number. Those rear mounted cameras were showing a line of cars that displayed a string of cars that looked exactly alike in profile. The screen shots of their instrument panels all showed the same readings. 11,800RPM seemed to be the magic number. I read an article during qualifying that one of the foreign drivers was complaining about all these guys came from dirt tracks. Seems to me he needed to look back though Indy history and see where most all the greats started on dirt or clay tracks and gained their talent. Very boring racing in my opinion. NASCAR is running the same course and would be wise to think about their direction. Much better racing when everyone is not equal as it brings out the individual creative side (think Smoky..think stretching the rules) car racing. I read a lot of books on a regular basis. I hit the local Goodwill, Salvation Arm and other used book sources looking for certain subjects. No fiction, novels or self help crap. I buy technical books, aircraft and aircraft company histories, automotive histories, biographies and automotive histories to name a few. I have bought a number of driver biography books and I can tell you none of those were about resent day Indy drivers. I wonder why? I'll take the earlier days every time. That's my rant for the day.
George
George
Mike
Well-Known Member
The sanctioning bodies all want spec cars, as it make them easier to tech. The fans think they all want spec cars, because then it all comes down to driver talent. The missed point in that is the best car on race day is not going to give a rotten driver an ounce of talent. And we all know, the real racers are looking for the loopholes in the rules. It's not cheating until you are caught.
If someone comes up with some innovative, new design, why do we want to stifle that? What would Indy look like, today, had Lotus, Colin Chapman, and Jimmy Clark not stepped outside the box, back in 1963? What would NHRA Top Fuel look like, had Garlits not stepped outside the box, back in 1971? And those are the huge milestone leaps, which do not even consider the small things that racers have learned and created throughout the years. Would you believe that a mere 0.125" radius change in the top of an oil pan pocket could make a near 5 HP difference in a 500 CID motor?
Time and time again, rules limitations have proven to be more costly than opening up rules. Talk to the carburetor people, and they will admit it only costs more money to conceal the modifications they were not supposed to make, than it does to simply modify the carb and drive on. When I was at the shop, we were buying heavily modified 390 carbs, that had nearly every modification carefully camouflaged. You could use standard gauges to check the carbs, and they would check like they had just come off the assembly line. But by the time all the modifications had been masked, those carbs were costing us a tick over $2,200! Where is the sense in that? Why not just allow a larger carb combination? Sure, some sugar daddy would find a way to spend far too much money cheating that rule, as well, but when you force someone to pay huge dollars for something they should not need, it tends to drive them out of the sport. You don't realize how out of hand all of this gets, until you see how much air flow can be gained by swaging the choke tower of a Holly carb. Yeah, the tower ends up looking awful, but what good carb company cannot re-dip carbs, these days?
If someone comes up with some innovative, new design, why do we want to stifle that? What would Indy look like, today, had Lotus, Colin Chapman, and Jimmy Clark not stepped outside the box, back in 1963? What would NHRA Top Fuel look like, had Garlits not stepped outside the box, back in 1971? And those are the huge milestone leaps, which do not even consider the small things that racers have learned and created throughout the years. Would you believe that a mere 0.125" radius change in the top of an oil pan pocket could make a near 5 HP difference in a 500 CID motor?
Time and time again, rules limitations have proven to be more costly than opening up rules. Talk to the carburetor people, and they will admit it only costs more money to conceal the modifications they were not supposed to make, than it does to simply modify the carb and drive on. When I was at the shop, we were buying heavily modified 390 carbs, that had nearly every modification carefully camouflaged. You could use standard gauges to check the carbs, and they would check like they had just come off the assembly line. But by the time all the modifications had been masked, those carbs were costing us a tick over $2,200! Where is the sense in that? Why not just allow a larger carb combination? Sure, some sugar daddy would find a way to spend far too much money cheating that rule, as well, but when you force someone to pay huge dollars for something they should not need, it tends to drive them out of the sport. You don't realize how out of hand all of this gets, until you see how much air flow can be gained by swaging the choke tower of a Holly carb. Yeah, the tower ends up looking awful, but what good carb company cannot re-dip carbs, these days?
Maybe this is more your style? now the longest gravel hill climb in the World (since they sealed Pikes Peak) it's a run what you brung event. Everything from factory prepped World Rally Cars, to home built all wheel drive single seaters, with turbo'd Hyabusa engines, to quads to trophy trucks etc . . various classes and an "unlimited" class for the Possom Bourne Trophy (kiwi motorsport legend that was killed a few years ago)
