Motorsport: The Drama Called Indianapolis 500

As A Racer, Team Owner, And Car Builder, Parnelli Jones Has Been There, Won That. Twenty-Five Sprint-Car Victories And The Same Number At The Wheel Of A Midget. Thirteen Stock Nascar And Usac Stock-Car Wins, Including The Usac Door-Slammer Championship In 1964. He Was Scca Trans-Am Champ In 1970, And Don't Forget Wins At Baja, Pikes Peak, And In Sports Cars. He Was The Winning Entrant/Car Builder When Al Unser Sr. Took Back-To-Back Indy 500s In 1970 And 1971; Unser And Joe Leonard Gave Him Usac Championships, Too. Jones's American-Built Parnelli Chassis Contested Formula 1 From 1974 To 1976. There Also Were Six Usac Champ-Car Race Victories, Including The Indy 500 In 1963, Driving For The Legendary J.C. "Aggie" Agajanian. As Is So Often The Case, There Were Judgment Calls To Make And At Least Two Sides To The Story That Year. American Stalwarts Versus The "Foreign Invasion." Old-Fashioned Front-Engine Roadsters Against Newfangled, Rear-Engine "Funny" Cars. Should Jones's Leading Roadster--Affectionately Dubbed "Old Calhoun"--Have Been Black-Flagged Due To A Leaky Oil Tank, Or Not? Jones Tells It From His Perspective--The Cockpit. Matt Stone

I Went To Indy For The First Time In 1960. I Didn't Race There That Year, But I Was There During Tire Testing. Since I'd Earned A Good Reputation As A Driver By That Time, They Let Me Take Some Laps In A Quinn Epperly Roadster. I Was Quick And Couldn't Wait To Get Back There The Next Year. This, As I Recall, Was Also Where I First Got Together With J.C. Agajanian, For Whom I'd Drive For My First Indy 500 In 1961 And For Several Years Afterward.

After Passing My Rookie Exam In 1961, I Qualified Fifth. We Were Running Real Narrow Tires At The Time, And They Kept Preaching "You Got To Get Tire Wear" To Me. At One Point During The Race, Jim Rathmann Was Leading, Rodger Ward Was Second, Eddie Sachs Was Third, And I Was Running Fourth. I Was Taking It Easy, Trying To Protect My Tires. I Didn't Know These Guys Were Really Racing Hard. We'd Just Come Out Of Turn Two; Rathmann Had A Couple Car Lengths On Ward, And Sachs Pulled Out To Pass Rodger. I Was Riding In A Perfect Draft And Just Whipped Out And Went By Both Of Them. I Had Momentum Now And Caught Rathmann Across The Short Chute. Coming Out Of Four, I Passed Him, Too. That Was Three Guys In Half A Lap.

I Led The Race For 27 Laps, But Then Lost A Cylinder, And Then Another. Somewhere Along The Way, I Got Hit In The Eye With Something That Came Off Another Car. It Cut Me Right In The Eyebrow And Kept Filling My Goggles Up With Blood, Just Like Tomato Juice. I Kept Dumping It Out Into The Cockpit Until It Finally Stopped. I Pitted Twice For New Spark Plugs, And It Ran Okay For A While, But Then Starting Fouling Again. Those Four-Cylinder Offys Were About Dead If You Lost More Than One Cylinder. I Finished 12th.

Since I Made A Good Impression On People In 1961, Firestone Gave Me The Tire-Testing Program Drive For 1962. I Did Something Like 1500 Miles Of Tire Testing That Year. I Watched The Film Of Jim Hurtibise's Qualifying Run When He Nearly Broke The 150-Mph Lap Record In 1959 And Noticed That He'd Slipped The Back End A Bit In The Middle Of The Corner. In The 1961 Race, Coming Out Of Turn Four, I Did Something Similar--And Almost Lost It. I Was Just Quick Enough To Save It, And I Knew The Next Time, I'd Be Ahead Of The Drift.

During Tire Testing At Indy For The 1962 500, I Started Practicing This Trick. I'd Slip It, Then Catch It, Slip It, And Catch It. And It Made Me That Much Quicker. Most Of The Guys Would Plow Through The Corners, Scrubbing Off Speed. By Pitching The Rear End Out A Bit, Then Catching It And Getting On It, The Effect Was Like Starting The Straightaway In The Middle Of The Corner. I Could Go Faster Sooner, And I Think It Gave Me A Real Edge.

If There Was Any Race I Should've Won, It Was 1962. I Mean, I Was Long Gone. But There Was Some Black Tape On The Frame Where The Brake Line Ran Near The Exhaust. The Heat Melted The Tape, Which Let The Brake Line Rub Up Against The Header. It Wore A Hole In The Brake Line, And I Lost The Brakes. I Was Still In The Lead, And I Stayed Out As Long As I Could, Until The Tires Were Showing Cord. I Gave Up The Lead On The Pit Stop And Then Backed Off A Bit And Stayed Out Of Everybody's Way. We At Least Collected Some More Lap Money, And I Finished Seventh In What Could've Been My First, Or Even Second, Indy Win In Two Years.

When The First Rear-Engine Car Came Along In 1961 (A Cooper, Driven By Jack Brabham), I Didn't Give It A Lot Of Thought. The Car Didn't Have A Lot Of Power. The American Roadsters Were So Much More Powerful; It Was Like Running A Midget Against A Sprint Car. During Tire Testing, I Tried To Get Firestone To Build Us Some Wider Tires. At The Time, We Were Running 18 And 20-Inch-Tall Wheels With Real Skinny Tires And Wearing Them Out Quickly. But Stock Cars Ran 15-Inch Wheels With Much Wider Tires. I Wasn't A Tire Engineer, But Felt That Wider Footprint Would Help Us In The Corners And Maybe Improve Wear. I Asked, "Hey, Can We Try Even A 16-Inch Tire?" But They Wouldn't Do It.

When Everyone Showed Up For The 1963 Race, The Lotus Teams Said No Way They Could Run Those Tall 18s. So Firestone Built Some 15-Inchers For Them With A Wide Footprint. When I Saw Them, I Flipped. It Was Just What I Was Trying To Get Them To Do Before. I Said, "Let's Put Those On Our Car, And I'll Break The Track Record Right Now, By At Least Two Miles An Hour." I Was Running A New Watson Roadster, Wearing Aggie's Traditional Number 98. We Called Up Halibrand And Had Them Make Up Wheels For Them. I Went Out And Broke The Track Record--By Two Miles An Hour. We Started From Pole, Qualifying At Better Than 151 Mph.

People Have Wondered If There Was Any Sort Of Us-Versus-Them Rivalry Between The American Teams And Drivers And All The Foreigners That Came To The Brickyard In Those Days. I Can Tell You That There Wasn't. We Had A Lot Of Fun With Them. I Remember That Some Of Their Mechanics Had Really Long Hair. Foyt And I Thought About Going Over There And "Trimming" It A Little For Them. Seriously, They Made A Good Impression With The Mid-Engine Cars Early On, Although The Roadsters Were Still Faster For A Couple Years.

Johnny Poulsen Was Our Mechanic. He Was An Innovator, Always Wanting To Try Something New. He Was Into Airplanes, And We Started Streamlining Things Here And There. The Conventional-Style Oil Tank Was An Oversize Teardrop, Made Out Of Steel. Poulsen Came Up With This Streamlined One, Made Out Of Aluminum. There Were Two Mounts That Held It To Calhoun's Frame Using Long Bolts.

In The Race, I Was Leading By A Ton, With Around 10 Laps To Go. I Came Off Turn Two, And The Rear End Slid Out From Under Me, And I Almost Lost It. What I Didn't Know At The Time Was That My Oil Tank Had Cracked At The Forward Mounting Bolt Area And Was Leaking Oil Onto My Left Rear Tire. These Tanks Were Never Filled All The Way Up Anyway; You Had To Have Breathing And Expansion Room For The Oil. But The Level Was High Enough Above The Crack To Allow Some Oil To Escape For A Lap Or Two. I Backed Off In Order To Figure Out What Happened And To Get Back My Confidence In The Car. That's When Jimmy Clark's Lotus Began Gaining On Me. He Was A Rookie At Indy That Year, But Already Well Established In Formula 1 By Then. Everyone Thought My Car Was In Trouble And That We Were Going To Have A Race Now. Another Reason People Thought I Was Oiling The Track Was That Every Time I Backed Off The Gas, A Few Drops Of Oil Sprayed Onto My Exhaust Pipe, Causing A Puff Of Smoke.

Lotus's Colin Chapman, Seeing The Oil Smoke And Clark Beginning To Reel Me In, Went To The Race Stewards Complaining That I Should Be Black-Flagged For Putting Oil Down On The Track. Aggie, Of Course, Went There To Defend Us. But By The Time They All Got Together To Argue About It, The Oil Level In The Tank Had Dropped Below Where The Crack Was. So It Stopped. There Was Nothing Else Wrong With My Car, Either--In Fact, One Of The Last Laps From The End Was Among My Quickest All Day.

I Had No Idea All This Was Going On; I Was Just Out There Driving. If Anything, The Leak Was More Of A Hindrance To Me Than Anyone Else, With The Oil Hitting My Tire And Exhaust. The Smoke Off The Pipe Made It Look Worse Than It Was. And The Oil Level In The Tank Had Come Down To Below The Crack Almost Immediately; It's Not Like I Was Spraying Oil Lap After Lap. Andy Granatelli Doesn't Like To Admit It, But His Novis Ran Completely Out Of Oil During The Race, And So Did The Vitafresh Orange Juice Car. So The Track Had Been Slippery All Day. But Everyone Wanted To Jump On Me About It, Because Mine Was The One That Showed The Most Obvious Signs.

Sachs Lost A Wheel And Spun, Then Spun Again And Hit The Wall, And He Blamed Me For It. We All Went To An Autolite-Sponsored Luncheon At The Holiday Inn The Next Day, And He Came Up To Me And Said, "Well, I Congratulate You On Winning, But They Should've Black-Flagged You For Oiling Down The Track." I Told Him It Was Oily All Day, And He Knew That. He Said, "Yeah, But I Spun In Your Oil." I Told Him He Was Full Of Shit. He Said I Was Full Of Shit. Then I Said, "I Ought To Punch You," And He Said, "Go Ahead." So I Popped Him Right In The Mouth. He Was Bleeding, And He Ran Up To His Room And Stuck A Little Black Flag In His Mouth And Got Some Photographer To Take A Picture Of It. Sachs Was Always A Showman.

Should I Have Been Black-Flagged? No Way.

If You're Going To Take The Race Out Of A Guy's Hands, You Better Make Damn Sure You're Correct About Why. Aggie, Chapman, And The Race Officials Were Talking, It Was Two Or Three Laps From The End. Remember, I Was In The Lead, And I Didn't Know What's Going On Back In The Pits. So, If They Black-Flagged Me, I Would've Just Kept Going Anyway. Now, Of Course, If They Were Right, They Would've Just Stopped Scoring Me, But No Way Would I Have Just Pulled In.

Clark Had Closed Up Temporarily, But Once The Oil Level In The Tank Had Stabilized And I Knew My Car Was Okay, I Started Pulling Away Again And Won The Race. There Was Some Speculation At The Time That Usac Might Have Favored The American Teams And Drivers, And That's Why They Didn't Black-Flag Me And Hand The Win To Clark. But That Was Absolutely Not True And Never Entered Into It. There Could've Been Bad Blood Between Aggie And Chapman, But That Never Happened, Either. After Indy, Clark And Dan Gurney Went On To Continue Their Formula 1 Schedule. Chapman And Aggie Partnered To Put Me In A Lotus. I Went On To Win Milwaukee And Trenton. For The Car, It Wore Aggie's Name And Number 98.

Harland Fengler, The 500's Chief Steward, Had A Tough Decision To Make. He Had To Be Absolutely Sure That I Was Causing A Problem, Before He Took Me Out Of The Race. It Wasn't Like Football, Where You Can Stop The Game, Review The Instant-Replay Video, And Then Decide If The Call Made On The Field Was Right, Or If There Was Enough Evidence To Prove Beyond Any Doubt That It Was Wrong, And Overturn It.

Fortunately, He Made The Right Call--At Least As Far As I'm Concerned.