Here’s what happened when Tony Qualified:

A careless USAC official manning the track lights in turn 1 failed to notice that Tony was given the green flag for his four-lap qualifying run by the starter Pat Bedand.  When Tony dove into Turn #1 at 225 mph, the fellow activated the yellow track lights.  Everyone saw it.

Tony dutifully lifted and coasted through Turns 1 and 2.  Then the green light flashed on for good, and Tony ran hard until receiving the checkered flag at the end of four laps.  His first lap, ruined by USAC’s error, was only 160.8 mph.  The second lap was 166.8, the third was 166.4, the fourth was 164.8.

Incredibly, Harlan Fengler, the Chief Steward at Indy, decided the yellow lap counted!  So Tony became the only driver in the history of Indy to be Officially Qualified under a yellow light.  Amid much controversy, and despite protest from sponsors and car owners alike, Fengler (who drove at Indy in 1923, and openly disliked road race drivers) insisted that Tony could not re-qualify the car.  That’s the way things were done in those days.  Of course, the four lap average was dismal and would not stand.  Taken alone, Tony’s three good laps would have placed him solidly in the race starting beside Dan Gurney.

He would have been the fastest rookie by a considerable margin, hence a shoo-in for Rookie of the Year.  Predictably, a week later Tony was bumped from the field by Bill Vukovich and forced to shop around for another ride.  Now began the desperate search for a “diamond in the rough.” 

With the sound of a Turbo Cosworth in the background, Tony considered the #45 Weinberger Homes Eagle, a four-year-old car that Ronnie Bucknum had driven the year before.  Bucknum had qualified it at 166.6, so the car should have been OK.  But Tony soon discovered that Al Miller had practiced in it on Monday the 18th and walked away without comment.  Worse yet, NASCAR star Charlie Glotzbach had spun it three different times and also walked.  Tony wisely resumed his search, making the rounds of various garages in Gasoline Alley looking for a decent ride.

Soon, Tony was invited to try the Thermo-King Gerhardt that Gary Bettenhausen had qualified the previous year at 167.77.  At the time, that was good for the 3rd row, starting just ahead of Dan Gurney.  That sounded promising, but something was dreadfully wrong.  The Gerhardt was bog slow.  They had tried several different drivers to no avail.  Gary Bettenhausen himself could do no better than 160 in it, nearly eight mph slower than he’d managed the previous year.  Tony managed 161, but then the car bit him.

I knew the car wasn’t right, but the crew said don’t worry about it, cranked the wastegate closed for max boost and sent me out.  That gave the me 1,000 horsepower instead of 800.  As I applied throttle coming out of turn 1, the boost kicked the car.  In my inexperience, I got up in the gray, remembered what Roger McCluskey told me: “When in that situation, spin it to the infield.”  I did three 360’s heading toward the short chute wall between 1 & 2.  I started pumping the brakes to no avail, it just brushed the outside wall.  Damage to the car was minor, but it couldn’t be repaired in time for another qualifying attempt.

In my panic, I forgot the brake pedal was not in the center as normal, it was to the very left of the cockpit.  All the time I was punching the brake pedal, it was actually the clutch!

I was royally screwed at Indy to say the least.  If Andretti, or Unser had to carry my yellow qualifying lap, they wouldn’t have made the race either.  I didn’t think I’d ever recover from the Indy fiasco.  It was my worst bad dream.  Unless I was able to pull off a major sponsorship, I would never run an Indy car again.  I didn’t get an opportunity to qualify another car.  I just watch in agony as I was bumped from the field.  The Auto Racing Writers & Broadcasters Association awarded me the Jigger Sirois award.  It’s the award no one wants, presented annually to the driver who endures the worst hard luck at Indy.  I worried it might cripple my career, but as things turned out, I enjoyed racing on five continents.

A short video of Tony’s qualifying efforts can be seen here.

A Bobby Unser story:

Bobby drove our works AAR Eagle after Gurney retired at the end of this season.  Before USAC allowed the use of wings, Bobby would often ask John Miller, our engine man, to turn the turbo boost down because his car wasn’t manageable with max power.  Our best turbo-Offy engine had 1,150 horsepower at maximum boost.

“Turbo lag” works both ways.  What few people realize, is that when the driver lifts off the throttle, the engine will briefly continue to produce about 500 horsepower.  The car has so much drag, that at top speed it instantly slows.  But if the driver has applied full throttle while exiting a corner, and needs to back off for an instant, that residual 500 horses can light the rear tires like a dragster.  It only takes a moment.

At that point, according to Bobby Unser, the car wants to “spin like the knob on a shithouse door”.  The truth is: too much power was nearly unmanageable in those days of inadequate aero downforce.  As you can see, Tony’s #36 Eagle had no downforce at all!  I was an Eagle designer at the time, and keenly remember it was crash, crash, crash until USAC permitted wings the next year.

You’re probably thinking that Tony wrecked the Eagle, but the truth is, he didn’t have a bit of trouble with it because his crew had so carefully groomed him to build speed gradually.   But Indy is a cruel place.

Disclaimer