Indianapolis 500

1973

By WILL GRIMSLEY

AP Special Correspondent

INDIANAPOLIS- It was the Speedway of rain and fire, frustration and tragedy.

But it came to a happy ending for Gordon Johncock, a gutty, little guy who came off of eight failures and beat auto racing's biggest stars for top honors in the 1973 Indianapolis 500 (video).

"I wish it had gone 500 miles," the tiny, 38-year-old racing veteran said after winning yesterday’s rain-delayed and rain-shortened 57th Indy race. "For me, it's the greatest thing in the world."

While he profited from the rain that halted the grueling test after 133 of the 200 laps over the 2 1/2-mile asphalt track, the brash, cocky graduate of the dirt tracks left no doubt that he thought he could have held on all the way.

He finished one-half lap ahead of Bill Vukovich Jr., while former champions A. J. Foyt Jr., Mark Donohue, Mario Andretti, and Al and Bobby Unser failed to finish the abbreviated race.

The curly-haired, pug-nosed 1973 champion, who associates say "fears no man or beast," gunned his Eagle-Offenhauser at a speed that at times reached almost 200 miles per hour under dark, menacing clouds and finished in a cold, drizzling rain.

He didn’t even have the pleasure of seeing the checkered flag.

"It doesn't matter," he said with a shrug when asked how he felt when flagman Pat Vidan ended the race with a red flag and never hauled out the checkered one, the source of every race driver's dream. "Winning was the important thing."

The red flag was a fitting badge for the 1973 Indianapolis 500. It was a race of flame and violence. The red flag was waved an unprecedented four times.

The red came out before the first lap Monday when David "Salt" Walther of Dayton, Ohio, crashed into the concrete will in front of the main grandstand, spun across the track and ended up upside down in a shattered, fiery mass (video).

A screaming ambulance carried Walther to the hospital where be was treated for severe burns and a broken wrist.

The red flag stopped Tuesday’s attempt before the cars could go beyond the pace lap, and it came out again yesterday early in the race- at the 51st lap- when Swede Savage's Eagle tore into the wall on the fourth turn, skidded 800 feet, somersaulted and finished in a ball of fire (video).

Thousands gasped. A sickening feeling gripped the hardy crowd of 20,000.

Tires flew through the sir. Fragments of Savage's car scattered over a 500-yard area. It was a mass of rubble.

It was a miracle that Savage was hauled out of the flaming wreckage alive, carried to the hospital with critically broken limbs and severe burns.

The car accidents were only a portion of the week's tragedies. On Monday, more than a dozen spectators suffered injury from the flying debris of skidding, crashing automobiles.

Yesterday, as soon as there was a grinding sound of a crash and burst of flame on the fourth turn, a young crew man named Armondo Teran, who was attending one of the cars, dashed onto the pit road leading to the scene of the accident.

He was cut down by a speeding fire truck rushing to the scene. He died in a hospital. He was 22, from Culver City, Calif., a member of the crew of New Zealander Graham McRae.

Ironically, he was part of the STP racing team that produced the champion, Johncock.

"I felt terrible," said Johncock. "I had been working with these guys throughout the month of May."

The rain produced frustration- for the drivers, mechanics, fans and the Speedway officials. The accidents brought a sobering thought to all.

Are these winged, turbocharged thunderbolts, now threatening the 200 miles per hour barrier, going too fast? Has auto racing become a sadistic ritual? Should somebody apply the brakes?

"The speed is getting so fast, it scares me to death," said 3-time winner A. J. Foyt, Jr. A. J. doesn't scare easily.

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