RIP Al Unser, 82
- Thread starter bigboxes
- Start date
Me too, I loved watching racing back then as a kid. There were so many big personalities!
I grew up in a drag racing family but we appreciated all the different series such as Indy/Nascar... something about watching those personalities in cars that more closely matched what you could buy off the showroom floor was so much more appealing.... heck, it's the reason my dad bought our 87 Monte SS Aerocoupe which was the fast back version made just for Nascar... Win on Sunday, Buy on Monday
Indy was the **** until they had their civil war. Then I went over to F1. Mears was my dude, but had to respect the Unsers as well
Funny you should say ****. In the mid-80s the Indy 500 was the site of one of my most embarrassing moments. It involved attending a Friday practice day, starting to slam beers at 7:00am and eating half a bucket of KFC chicken on the way to the stadium, along with explosive diarrhea in front of 100 strangers in an open-air bathroom.
….embarrassing for those around me, that is. Much better to take care of it in the toilet than in my shorts.
It was a good race this year. Pretty cool that Hy-Vee had a car in the field. I really hope Castroneves can get his fifth title. He is so great with the fans.
I was never a big race fan as a kid, but back in the day if you were any kind of sports fan it still seemed like you followed the big races and knew who the big name drivers were. All those names are a walk down memory lane. Today, I can't name one Indy car driver. Is there a new generation of the Unser or Andretti families driving today?
Honestly I have no clue. I get the feeling, and could be wrong, that your connection to a rich family with sponsorship connections is about as important as your driving ability. I think the last guy I really admired was Dan Wheldon, who sadly was killed on track.
I definitely this is true to some extent. In F1, Nikita Mazepin races for Haas. One of their main sponsors is URALKALI, which is part of URALCHEM. That was founded by Mazepin’s dad. If he wasn’t pumping so much money into Haas, Nikita probably isn’t driving in F1. However, Haas needs the money so Mazepin will stick around for a while.
Another example is Lance Stroll, whose dad is a part owner of the Aston Martin F1 team. At least he’s shown to be a fairly solid driver. Mick Schumacher is another. His dad is Michael Schumacher. Mick is a good young driver. It will be exciting to see him driving for someone other than Haas someday.