I couldn't believe I was actually seeing his whole body. Legs and shoes sticking out where the front of the car should've been. One of the worst I've ever seen. Thank God he survived.
That was also my first Indy 500 that I sat through from start to finish. I watched only a small part of the 1980 race. A bit of my back story: In order to watch the ‘81 Indy 500 (I was very young at the time) I decided that I needed to pick a favorite driver from the year before, so I picked Mario Andretti; because it turned out that my AFX racing set had his 1978 John Player Lotus that he won the F-1 title in. I miss that AFX track.
@@moonytheloony6516Me too! I had some of the G Force cars, or whatever they were called, with the strong magnets to keep them held down. I also had a couple of the grand stands that made "engine noise" but they sounded more like a chainsaw! LOL! But, all in all, those race tracks and cars were awesome! I remember I had some Porsche 917 CanAm cars, a bunch of NASCARS, the aforementioned F1 GForce cars. Life was good as a kid. Thanks for triggering some nice memories!
My grandmother was a nurse. She worked at Methodist Hospital (now IU Health). She treated various famous drivers, such as Danny Ongais. She also treated Landon Turner. She worked with Dr. Terry Trammell.
Ongais`s crash traumatized me when I saw this live, as a kid. It`s also spooky seeing Gordon Smiley race and crash here, knowing what happened a year later.....
@@saltybildo4415 "Saw", not "Seen" ... but your comment is right on. No racing fan goes to the track to view carnage. It's the most "real" sport, in that the prospect of death is always present. Respect to all those who put their lives on the line.
@@saltybildo4415 Just so everyone knows; Stan Fox was not killed in that crash. I saw that crash on TV, and thought "another Indycar driver with major leg trauma". But it turned out his legs were OK. He did have a concussion.
And just as amazingly, in the 33-car field in 1981, there were 11 different chassis in the field. Of course, you had Penskes, Wildcats, the Eagle and the Chaparral, but also in that field were McLarens, two Longhorns, a Schkee driven by Tom Klausler, a Lightning driven by Gary Bettenhausen, a Phoenix chassis from Jerry O'Connell's team, the Coyote of A.J. Foyt, the Parnelli driven by Tim Richmond (Foyt's other team car), Interscope Racing's self-built car, and two teams, Bignotti-Cotter and the Whittington Brothers Racing, brought a preview of the future with the Indy debut of the March, with Sneva being the fastest qualifier and Bill Whittington being the fifth-fastest qualifier in the field. In fact, among the top six finishers, there were five different chassis makes, Penske (B. Unser and Brabham), Wildcat (Andretti), McLaren (Schuppan), Phoenix (Cogan), and Longhorn (Sheldon Kinser).
man I love these old cars, they were so much more raw and brute compared to new cars and successfully getting your car to survive the whole race was much harder. Everything was on the knife edge of blowing up/failing, it was intense.
My Dad and I both sat in Bobby Unser's (eventual) winning car a couple years later and had our pictures taken in it after the car had been repainted in different colors. I still have the Polaroid.
I remember how we left the race track thinking Bobby won. Then we got home and started getting the news that it was being contested. It sure tainted my memories of it...as sparse as they are now.
Its palpable how the broadcast was targetted to a much more knowledgeable, mature and interested audience, they are keener to explain technical elements are do not shy away from telling hard truths and hard-to-watch images. Just shows how much we are devolving as a species.
Unser clearly jumped the start, little did anyone know that because of this, the ensuing rule change for the pace speeds would indirectly lead to one of the all-time infamous crashes ever at IMS a year later. And the irony of it was that it was Unsers replacement, Kevin Cogan who would instigate the crash.
After all the smoke cleared............ Bobby Unser was declared the winner! Those that make the decisions at the IMS upheld the finishing order. Mario finished 2nd. Quit the sniveling people, it was almost 40 years ago. Let it go already!
No, actually Bobby was penalized enough time to put him 2nd & Mario was declared "The Winner" the next day. Then Penske sued & the case went to court. Almost 6-months later, that decision was reversed (I don't recall by a court decision, or if Indy just threw in the towel) and Bobby was declared "Winner" once again. In the end, just follow the 💰 cause Penske had more than the other guys. The fastest car won the race, so I don't have a problem with it 🤷🏻♂️
He has an open fracture on hi right leg. Broken left hip. Chest injuries. Possible internal injuries. A concussion. He was on fire. "His condition is fairly good" If you say so Doc...
Even if you took the young'ns, with they're i-phones, to Indy, they still wouldn't truly experience one of those fire breathing monster's screaming past them at 240mph, because they would STILL be looking at they're i-phones! 🤬 Truly a shame they have no clue what wonders of life they're missing 😣
422,000 paid attendance! The Golden Age of Indy is behind us, Rest in Peace Bobby Unser. (Bobby was always a better commentator than Jackie I thought.)
The announces stated that Sneva being a "brides maid" might have cost him his Penske seat. he won the Drivers Championship in 1977-78. That pit fire still freaks me out 41 years later.
Mario Andretti is my favorite driver of all time but Bobby Unser won this race. Mario passed cars as well so they both should have been given a one lap penalty and Bobby Unser would still win the race. From time to time you see a dominant car here like Mario in 87 or Mears in 88 but this car is the furthest away from the wall I've ever seen a dominant car run. How much more did Uncle Bobby have if he ran the typical line out to the wall? Bobby had everyone covered and he wasn't even pushing the car. Besides as a Mario fan it wouldn't be a true win and would have an asterisk in people's minds
@@raymonddionne5088 More importantly, what Bobby and Mario did was not against USAC rules. No penalty was stated for that supposed infraction. There should've been, but that was one of many examples of USAC's incompetence as a sanctioning body.
@@raymonddionne5088 So very well put Mr Dionne! That is exactly how I've felt about it since the race ended in 81. Bobby Unser is my all-time favorite & Mario became "that guy" for me after Bobby U's retirement. I was a fan of Mario even then, but you know your guy is YOUR GUY, so was happy Bobby won & really, rightfully so, he absolutely had the DOMINANT CAR 👍
Something that gets lost among all the other controversy surrounding this race is that Bobby Unser did not drink the milk in victory lane after this one. Emmo caught a lot of grief in 1993, probably because he substituted the OJ as a publicity stunt. Bobby does not seem to catch the same level of backlash.
HODIUSDUDE well don’t forget that a few year later Tony George probably took that to heart personal and decided to split with CART and create the IRL. However the split was total nonsense mostly in the 90s.
HODIUSDUDE ....The milk “tradition” was in itself a publicity stunt, so I don’t look upon it with the same reverence as most. Why should anyone? Just because it’s an old publicity stunt doesn’t make it precious.
The theory around using Methanol rather Petrol is this Petrol burns at minus 22 degress Methanol burns at 11 degress. Okay point taken it is a lot harder to start a Methanol fire than it is to start a Petrol fire but the big danger is that you cannot see a Methanol fire and untrained people might think why is that person doing a mad dance when he is on fire! Thank god they changed the Mixture a while back to Partial Petrol partial Methanol.
From a nowadays viewpoint, yes. Different times. Even though ovals are still insanely dangerous nowadays. Funnily, they talk about how safe the sport now is in the video. It's all a snapshot in time.
Rules are Rules. From a neutral position I think Mario IMHO should have won that race. Danny Ongias : Amazing he went was able too and had the guts to race again after that horrific crash! Reminds me of the Martin Donnelly Accident of Spanish F1 GP of 1990. He some how survived too a similar horror smash in his Lotus!
Ongais was leading that race before the bad pit stop...I think he was POd he lost the lead like that...then tried to make a late pass going into the corner and it turned out bad.
If Foyt had never parted company with George Bignotti, he would have won at least six or seven Indy 500s total. It's unfortunately A.J.'s greatest failing that he had to always run the entire operation himself and while he had his great moments as a car owner, his stubborness has been why his team has been the worst in Indy Car for nearly 20 years running now.
The overall presentation, the announcers obviously in particular, remind me of a time when our culture was mostly by and for adults. It was assumed the audience were emotionally and intellectually mature, and were spoken to and presented broadcasts as such. In today's infantilized endless adolescence culture it's all at a 15 year old level...the shouting cheeseball hams of announcers, the crazed music and graphics, the ad breaks every 5 minutes pushing the latest drug for the latest malady. The drivers behaving like children (especially in NASCAR, the few times I've watched it my jaw hit the floor as I watched professional racer car drivers intentionally wreck people and then commit felony assault...no thanks, not for me) and the whole thing presented and produced as if for ADD-addled children. The 'news' now is the same, editorializing wildly and thinking their jobs are protecting all the adult babies out there from things they just can't know, telling them not to drive into floods with nursery rhymes ('turn around, don't drown') etc. instead of their actual job, reporting the facts to adults as best they can ascertain them. Maybe I'm a bit sensitive as my dad was a journalist when it was a serious, noble profession, and I have great memories of watching many of these taped delayed Indy's with him on many a Memorial Day night (and then during the day from '86 on when live) and they have a lot of meaning to me. And the class and dignity of McKay, Stewart, Economaki, Posey et al stands in such stark contrast to today's childishly nicknamed ('hey T Bell!') screaming circus barkers, which sadly represents our cultural shift/decline as a whole. Very grateful to IndyCar for posting all these classics for all the great memories of a very different time. And of wonderful times sharing these races as a young kid with my dad.
Phil Harris is, probably, best known for being the voice of Baloo the Bear in the 1960s Disney version of "The Jungle Book". He, also, made his name singing 'nonsense' songs and proved, here, that he was better suited to those than serious anthems....
@@donroberts2126 I know him better for his years on Jack Benny's radio show. He was a great entertainer/bandleader but this was not one of his finer moments.
Love the voice of the guy doing the intro/sponsor plugs at the very beginning of the broadcast and through out the race. What is his name if anyone knows?
32:58 Sam Posey explains ground effects. This is great. (ahem) I was 12 when this race happened. Didn't know I loved racing yet. Nobody in my family saw anything interesting "watching a bunch of cars drive around in a circle." If I could have been put in front of the tv at this moment, I would have been hooked a lot earlier. This is high education in a 90 sec format. (or however long). Really cool, love watching this old indy 500s! p.s. didn't recognize the intro song, but it was NOT Jim Neigbors.
I don't know what the deal was with that guy. They didn't even have the Purdue band accompanying him. He must have thought he was good enough that he didn't want the band taking anything away from his performance. 😂
What a wild race and a raw and real ABC broadcast: the terrifying Mears pit fire, the disputed results, the appalling Ongais crash and the sight of his limp limbs hanging out of the wreckage; the unglamorous, blue-collar Economaki hustling through the pits with the energy of man half his age, a peeved Al Unser swatting him away, a taped segment with that wily rooster Bobby Unser pronouncing himself "the best", the late night comments from the protesting Mario and the exhausted Dr. Trammell. A spectacle. As good as it gets.
@@ikshields It's not exactly the same design as 1981, but Simpson's "Bandit" series still has a very similar design. simpsonraceproducts.com/images/products/620.png
@@ikshields actually Mr Shields, it's not a Darth Vader, it's a Storm Trooper helmet. I raced Go-karts thru the 70's-80's & had a Trooper helmet, then sold it to buy the new Simpson. I've been kicking myself for doing that the last 38yrs! 😭
Safety workers used up a lot of fire extinguishers in the Rick Mears pit fire. In later years, they would douse the fire by throwing buckets of water to dilute the alcohol. That was more effective at putting the fire out quickly. They also added a man with a water hose to spray around the fuel receptacle to dilute any alcohol that may have spilled when the refueling hose was pulled out.
In fact, the foam from the fire extinguishers completely blocked the main straightaway to the point that the any drivers going on the main straightaway would have been completely blinded for a lap or two, which is one reason the caution flag should have been thrown for that pit fire (another is the number of safety personnel and equipment that were used in the fighting of that fire).
I going to watch this many times over. The cars -engine sounds, crowds.....listened to the race with just the audio....those were the best times and races. ABC and the announcer s.
I think you'll find a lot of people who agree with you on the "controversial" part. After all was said and done, Bobby Unser was the winner, but the fight over whether or not he was subject to a penalty left such a bad taste in his mouth that he retired from racing (well, driving _in_ races; he did later go into the commentary booth). Can't say I blame him.
The problem is that the commercials were "racked" to play in a certain order. With it being 1981, there may not have been time to slip that spot to a later time.
@@almostfm And of course, the first thing that played during that particular break was a promo for ABC's Monday Night Baseball, and of course, MLB went on strike shortly after the race (the original strike deadline was for five days after this race was run, but was extended two weeks to June 12, when the MLB players went out on strike). For some strange reason, the Indianapolis 500 always seemed to reflect the times, and 1981 was certainly right on cue, whether it was the post-qualifying controversy involving Jerry Sneva and Jerry Karl, Karl getting arrested at IMS on Carb Day, resulting in veteran Bob Harkey having to practice Karl's car (Karl was released and drive in the race). Then of course, before the two major controversies, there was the botched start, when seven cars passed the S/F line BEFORE the green flag came out, and then during the caution for Don Whittington's crash, both Tom Sneva and Bill Whittington passed the pace car in anticipation of a restart that never happened (neither driver was penalized because they let the pace car repass them, so no advantage was gained). And that was all before the Mears pit fire, which should have brought out the caution, but didn't, and the controversy regarding Bobby Unser and Mario Andretti both passing cars leaving the pits during the caution for Gordon Smiley's crash (Unser passed 8 and Andretti passed 3, though Andretti did appear to let the furthest forward of the 3 cars her passed repass him).
"33:00" - "35:10" Sam Posey has a very informative and easy to understand explanation,for the layman, about Ground Effects. A little insert for anyone who doesn't know about the effect......like his demo!!
@@brandond5209 Reading your comments I can see you're a connoisseur of this stuff,so I'd like you to tell me something about what issues did the ground effect bring into driving on oval raceways, especially on banked curves.Thx a lot.
![[TH] FS vs BME - VCT Ascension Pacific - Lower Bracket Final](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/wnygqsR2Fig/mqdefault.jpg)
Thank you Indycar, for uploading these great races from the past.
will always amaze me how Danny survived that crash, that car utterly exploded.
I couldn't believe I was actually seeing his whole body. Legs and shoes sticking out where the front of the car should've been. One of the worst I've ever seen. Thank God he survived.
I thought he was dead he was unresponsive the entire time
I thought he was died
he hit so hard he knocked the concrete wall down and hurt some spectators!
I was young at the time and I thought he was gone. I went to bed and thats all I could remember is Ongais in the wreckage like that.
This was my first Indy 500 and we got home in time to see the race on TV.
That was also my first Indy 500 that I sat through from start to finish. I watched only a small part of the 1980 race.
A bit of my back story:
In order to watch the ‘81 Indy 500 (I was very young at the time) I decided that I needed to pick a favorite driver from the year before, so I picked Mario Andretti; because it turned out that my AFX racing set had his 1978 John Player Lotus that he won the F-1 title in.
I miss that AFX track.
@@moonytheloony6516Me too! I had some of the G Force cars, or whatever they were called, with the strong magnets to keep them held down. I also had a couple of the grand stands that made "engine noise" but they sounded more like a chainsaw! LOL! But, all in all, those race tracks and cars were awesome! I remember I had some Porsche 917 CanAm cars, a bunch of NASCARS, the aforementioned F1 GForce cars. Life was good as a kid. Thanks for triggering some nice memories!
44:53 when racing drivers could act like themselves and actual people instead of walking advertisements
What a great broadcast. Jim Mackay and Jackie Stewart.
Miss Jim McKay
I remember those days when the race was taped delayed. RIP Bobby Unser.
the largest sporting event in the world and its tape delay!
It was always shown that evening...never understood that, always a sellout like 300,000 people.
@@topmech71 It was actually 500,000 I have been to four of them. I have witnessed Mears fourth and Unser Sr. The best time in my life.
My grandmother was a nurse. She worked at Methodist Hospital (now IU Health). She treated various famous drivers, such as Danny Ongais. She also treated Landon Turner. She worked with Dr. Terry Trammell.
True fact Landon turner's basketball career came to an abrupt end he almost got killed
This sure brings back memories I love to watch the Indianapolis 500 !!!
Ongais`s crash traumatized me when I saw this live, as a kid.
It`s also spooky seeing Gordon Smiley race and crash here, knowing what happened a year later.....
I seen stan fox live it was right in front of us in the south chute, craziest thing I ever seen in person, in no way "traumatized" though RIP Stan
I was in the small grandstand at the entrance of Three. The sound of Danny's car hitting the wall will never leave me.
I'm not understanding the comparison. G. Smileys body blew apart brains and all... Ongias is still alive & well..
@@saltybildo4415 "Saw", not "Seen" ... but your comment is right on. No racing fan goes to the track to view carnage. It's the most "real" sport, in that the prospect of death is always present. Respect to all those who put their lives on the line.
@@saltybildo4415 Just so everyone knows; Stan Fox was not killed in that crash. I saw that crash on TV, and thought "another Indycar driver with major leg trauma". But it turned out his legs were OK. He did have a concussion.
Rest in Peace, Bobby Unser.
Thanks for uploading this classic race!
53 cars trying to qualify!! Amazing, the golden days
And just as amazingly, in the 33-car field in 1981, there were 11 different chassis in the field. Of course, you had Penskes, Wildcats, the Eagle and the Chaparral, but also in that field were McLarens, two Longhorns, a Schkee driven by Tom Klausler, a Lightning driven by Gary Bettenhausen, a Phoenix chassis from Jerry O'Connell's team, the Coyote of A.J. Foyt, the Parnelli driven by Tim Richmond (Foyt's other team car), Interscope Racing's self-built car, and two teams, Bignotti-Cotter and the Whittington Brothers Racing, brought a preview of the future with the Indy debut of the March, with Sneva being the fastest qualifier and Bill Whittington being the fifth-fastest qualifier in the field. In fact, among the top six finishers, there were five different chassis makes, Penske (B. Unser and Brabham), Wildcat (Andretti), McLaren (Schuppan), Phoenix (Cogan), and Longhorn (Sheldon Kinser).
Richmond technically wasn't a Foyt team car. After George Snider qualified the car as a Foyt team car, the car was sold to Richmond's team outright.
I’m sure
This was before the Tony George racing league and his 25-8 rule.
Used to not be an over sanctioned sport back then lol
2:16:38 I have the highest respect for ER doctors like this. TRUE doctors.
My mom worked with him when he was a resident. Good guy.
Dr Trammell helped A LOT of racers post-crash.
@@SolamenteVees absolutely
He saved lives, Alex Zanardi the most famous
man I love these old cars, they were so much more raw and brute compared to new cars and successfully getting your car to survive the whole race was much harder. Everything was on the knife edge of blowing up/failing, it was intense.
I love how long the tires last compared to the 2020's.
Agreed. Back then it was a battle of ideas, engineers and drivers.
Thank you for uploading- Great picture Quality!👍🏼😊
RIP Bobby Unser.
WTF? Here I am in Australia. 2018. Never really been into Indy until some sim racing this year. I am totally engrossed. lols Thanks
You need to watch the 1982 Indy 500. The last 20 laps will give you goosebumps. I know because I was there!
@@CaptainRon956 he’s making a move! No!
My Dad and I both sat in Bobby Unser's (eventual) winning car a couple years later and had our pictures taken in it after the car had been repainted in different colors. I still have the Polaroid.
9:51 - Voyage - From East to East. Nice instrumental
Some producer was doing the Jean Luc Picard facepalm that day
3:45 When the traditional singing of "Back Home Again in Indiana" meets Barry Manilow at the Copacabana.
cool gonna run this in the background while finishing my assignment
I remember how we left the race track thinking Bobby won. Then we got home and started getting the news that it was being contested. It sure tainted my memories of it...as sparse as they are now.
Its palpable how the broadcast was targetted to a much more knowledgeable, mature and interested audience, they are keener to explain technical elements are do not shy away from telling hard truths and hard-to-watch images. Just shows how much we are devolving as a species.
Ahh i love these vintage rsces!!!
Never understood the epaulets until now... 56:00
invisible alcohol fires, absolutely nuts!
Reminds me of "The Ballad Of Ricky Bobby", when Will Farrell was rolling around yelling he was on fire!
Sam's ground effects tutorial was good. I DIDN't know how it worked before that.
The designs brings back memories
Unser clearly jumped the start, little did anyone know that because of this, the ensuing rule change for the pace speeds would indirectly lead to one of the all-time infamous crashes ever at IMS a year later. And the irony of it was that it was Unsers replacement, Kevin Cogan who would instigate the crash.
i love the look of the early 80s Indy cars.
That has to be the worst rendition of Back Home Again I've ever heard. Was the guy hammered?
* Horrific Crash *
* Plays "Celebration" *
That was a nice explanation and demonstration of ground effect, better than those racing Geek youtuber that just use 3D demo
If possible please leave old commercials in
I like them too. Some of the older NFL games from this era have if you like.
After all the smoke cleared............
Bobby Unser was declared the winner! Those that make the decisions at the IMS upheld the finishing order. Mario finished 2nd. Quit the sniveling people, it was almost 40 years ago. Let it go already!
No, actually Bobby was penalized enough time to put him 2nd & Mario was declared "The Winner" the next day. Then Penske sued & the case went to court. Almost 6-months later, that decision was reversed (I don't recall by a court decision, or if Indy just threw in the towel) and Bobby was declared "Winner" once again. In the end, just follow the 💰 cause Penske had more than the other guys. The fastest car won the race, so I don't have a problem with it 🤷🏻♂️
R.I.P Bobby.
He has an open fracture on hi right leg. Broken left hip. Chest injuries. Possible internal injuries. A concussion. He was on fire.
"His condition is fairly good" If you say so Doc...
Comparatively... Considering what happened to Gordon Smiley a year later, it WAS fairly good. But I get what you mean.
Look at that unadulterated starting line-up. Nice and clean!
Good ole days. Stands packed. Now racing has to compete with the iphone.
Even if you took the young'ns, with they're i-phones, to Indy, they still wouldn't truly experience one of those fire breathing monster's screaming past them at 240mph, because they would STILL be looking at they're i-phones! 🤬
Truly a shame they have no clue what wonders of life they're missing 😣
Indycar died in 1996 with Tony George's IRL, spec car garbage.
Dr. Terry Trammell totally rocks 😎
Even Jackie Stewart knew passing cars, on exiting the pits under yellow, was a no-no.
Jackie didn't know the rulebook. Also, his call was made in post-production.
i remember watching this race when i was 9 years old.
422,000 paid attendance!
The Golden Age of Indy is behind us,
Rest in Peace Bobby Unser.
(Bobby was always a better commentator than Jackie I thought.)
Paul Tracy is the true winner... OH wait. Wrong race.
Where did they find that singer for "Back Home Again in Indiana"?? Good GAWD that was horrible.....
If you’re wondering, the horror of the Mears Pit Fire is at 53:28.
39.50 JYS just casually dropping how the Vietnam war improved safety at Indy
The announces stated that Sneva being a "brides maid" might have cost him his Penske seat. he won the Drivers Championship in 1977-78.
That pit fire still freaks me out 41 years later.
And the Ongais crash.
Now,i know why F1 doesn't upload full race
It's hard to get a full race with english commentary and then digitize it
@Syd Floyd they had been re-living the 2008 Brazilian GP
The worse version of 'Back home again in Indiana' I have ever heard. Ongais' wreck is at 59:40, real ugly! The Unser yellow pass at 1:43:30.
Bad as it was, the all time worst was 1925 race winner Pete De Paolo doing it in 1971.
1:43:55
The biggest scam in motosport history (except Michael Schumacher in 1994 Australia GP and Europa GP 1997)
Mario won that race!!
Mario Andretti is my favorite driver of all time but Bobby Unser won this race. Mario passed cars as well so they both should have been given a one lap penalty and Bobby Unser would still win the race. From time to time you see a dominant car here like Mario in 87 or Mears in 88 but this car is the furthest away from the wall I've ever seen a dominant car run. How much more did Uncle Bobby have if he ran the typical line out to the wall? Bobby had everyone covered and he wasn't even pushing the car. Besides as a Mario fan it wouldn't be a true win and would have an asterisk in people's minds
@@raymonddionne5088 More importantly, what Bobby and Mario did was not against USAC rules. No penalty was stated for that supposed infraction. There should've been, but that was one of many examples of USAC's incompetence as a sanctioning body.
Lol
Mario was bitchin alot
@@raymonddionne5088 So very well put Mr Dionne! That is exactly how I've felt about it since the race ended in 81. Bobby Unser is my all-time favorite & Mario became "that guy" for me after Bobby U's retirement. I was a fan of Mario even then, but you know your guy is YOUR GUY, so was happy Bobby won & really, rightfully so, he absolutely had the DOMINANT CAR 👍
Something that gets lost among all the other controversy surrounding this race is that Bobby Unser did not drink the milk in victory lane after this one. Emmo caught a lot of grief in 1993, probably because he substituted the OJ as a publicity stunt. Bobby does not seem to catch the same level of backlash.
HODIUSDUDE well don’t forget that a few year later Tony George probably took that to heart personal and decided to split with CART and create the IRL. However the split was total nonsense mostly in the 90s.
HODIUSDUDE ....The milk “tradition” was in itself a publicity stunt, so I don’t look upon it with the same reverence as most. Why should anyone? Just because it’s an old publicity stunt doesn’t make it precious.
Call me crazy but I remember the Indy 500 being broadcast live during the day on Memorial day weekend.....not at night
The theory around using Methanol rather Petrol is this Petrol burns at minus 22 degress Methanol burns at 11 degress. Okay point taken it is a lot harder to start a Methanol fire than it is to start a Petrol fire but the big danger is that you cannot see a Methanol fire and untrained people might think why is that person doing a mad dance when he is on fire! Thank god they changed the Mixture a while back to Partial Petrol partial Methanol.
The Great Dispute
“The explosions you hear are the fireworks…always set off at the beginning of the race…has nothing to do with the race itself.” -J McKay
Motorsports, especially in the US, the only sport where sons inherit dad and uncles, grand dad's talent. Funny
wow.. what a completely insanely dangerous time
It's always been that way with auto racing. Make the cars fast, then figure out what you have to do for safety.
You should go back and watch the 1950s highlights.
From a nowadays viewpoint, yes. Different times. Even though ovals are still insanely dangerous nowadays.
Funnily, they talk about how safe the sport now is in the video. It's all a snapshot in time.
Phil Harris can't carry a tune; bring back Jim Nabors, please!
You got that right!!
My first of 13 races.
Sir Jackie Stewart could read the Oxford Dictionary, and make it interesting
Oof that singer DID NOT do Back Home Again justice.
Rules are Rules. From a neutral position I think Mario IMHO should have won that race. Danny Ongias : Amazing he went was able too and had the guts to race again after that horrific crash! Reminds me of the Martin Donnelly Accident of Spanish F1 GP of 1990. He some how survived too a similar horror smash in his Lotus!
Andretti Whine.
Ongais was leading that race before the bad pit stop...I think he was POd he lost the lead like that...then tried to make a late pass going into the corner and it turned out bad.
Think how many indy 500 A.J.Foyt Jr. Would have won if he wountnt drove for number one team?
If Foyt had never parted company with George Bignotti, he would have won at least six or seven Indy 500s total. It's unfortunately A.J.'s greatest failing that he had to always run the entire operation himself and while he had his great moments as a car owner, his stubborness has been why his team has been the worst in Indy Car for nearly 20 years running now.
@@epaddon Foyt is who he is & although he's mellowed a little with age, he'll NEVER truly change & BLESS him for it! 💪😎👍
The overall presentation, the announcers obviously in particular, remind me of a time when our culture was mostly by and for adults. It was assumed the audience were emotionally and intellectually mature, and were spoken to and presented broadcasts as such. In today's infantilized endless adolescence culture it's all at a 15 year old level...the shouting cheeseball hams of announcers, the crazed music and graphics, the ad breaks every 5 minutes pushing the latest drug for the latest malady. The drivers behaving like children (especially in NASCAR, the few times I've watched it my jaw hit the floor as I watched professional racer car drivers intentionally wreck people and then commit felony assault...no thanks, not for me) and the whole thing presented and produced as if for ADD-addled children. The 'news' now is the same, editorializing wildly and thinking their jobs are protecting all the adult babies out there from things they just can't know, telling them not to drive into floods with nursery rhymes ('turn around, don't drown') etc. instead of their actual job, reporting the facts to adults as best they can ascertain them. Maybe I'm a bit sensitive as my dad was a journalist when it was a serious, noble profession, and I have great memories of watching many of these taped delayed Indy's with him on many a Memorial Day night (and then during the day from '86 on when live) and they have a lot of meaning to me. And the class and dignity of McKay, Stewart, Economaki, Posey et al stands in such stark contrast to today's childishly nicknamed ('hey T Bell!') screaming circus barkers, which sadly represents our cultural shift/decline as a whole. Very grateful to IndyCar for posting all these classics for all the great memories of a very different time. And of wonderful times sharing these races as a young kid with my dad.
OOh, such bad chroma keying. Lots of spill.
The south chute wasnt penski yellow yet
Very unfortunate for Gordon Johncock.
Who is Phil Harris? He was terrible. Where was Jim Nabors that year?
Phil Harris is, probably, best known for being the voice of Baloo the Bear in the 1960s Disney version of "The Jungle Book". He, also, made his name singing 'nonsense' songs and proved, here, that he was better suited to those than serious anthems....
@@donroberts2126 I know him better for his years on Jack Benny's radio show. He was a great entertainer/bandleader but this was not one of his finer moments.
@@epaddon Well, I'm English, so I wouldn't have caught that!
Gentleman ligue os seus motores
0:11
55:16
1:05:00 Nice timing ABC...
Best
that should have been number two for Mario.
The "mediate news" 1:59:07 Foytism!
Phil Harris sings the national anthem?? Where was Jim Nabors? Lots of people could have done a better job than Phil Harris!
Since when did "Back Home Again In Indiana" become the National Anthem?
Nabors was with his boyfriend!
Love the voice of the guy doing the intro/sponsor plugs at the very beginning of the broadcast and through out the race. What is his name if anyone knows?
@Tyrone Taylor sorry I should have been more specific... I'm referring to the voice of the guy who starts at about 2:05.
32:58 Sam Posey explains ground effects. This is great. (ahem) I was 12 when this race happened. Didn't know I loved racing yet. Nobody in my family saw anything interesting "watching a bunch of cars drive around in a circle." If I could have been put in front of the tv at this moment, I would have been hooked a lot earlier. This is high education in a 90 sec format. (or however long). Really cool, love watching this old indy 500s!
p.s. didn't recognize the intro song, but it was NOT Jim Neigbors.
I don't know what the deal was with that guy. They didn't even have the Purdue band accompanying him. He must have thought he was good enough that he didn't want the band taking anything away from his performance. 😂
2:12:50
53:27
What a wild race and a raw and real ABC broadcast: the terrifying Mears pit fire, the disputed results, the appalling Ongais crash and the sight of his limp limbs hanging out of the wreckage; the unglamorous, blue-collar Economaki hustling through the pits with the energy of man half his age, a peeved Al Unser swatting him away, a taped segment with that wily rooster Bobby Unser pronouncing himself "the best", the late night comments from the protesting Mario and the exhausted Dr. Trammell. A spectacle. As good as it gets.
These cars sound so cool
"luck is where opportunity meets preperation" he said with a look to the camera. what a scene!
There has never been a driver more intense about his craft, than The Great Bobby Unser! 💪😎👍
Even the helmets were better back then.
gr0bbelaar - Yep, that Simpson “Darth Vader” helmet sure made racing fun for awhile, didn’t it? 😎👍🏻
It's so cool it's borderline pornography!
@@ikshields It's not exactly the same design as 1981, but Simpson's "Bandit" series still has a very similar design. simpsonraceproducts.com/images/products/620.png
@@almostfm Helmets are cool but the race definitely wasnt!
@@ikshields actually Mr Shields, it's not a Darth Vader, it's a Storm Trooper helmet. I raced Go-karts thru the 70's-80's & had a Trooper helmet, then sold it to buy the new Simpson. I've been kicking myself for doing that the last 38yrs! 😭
Safety workers used up a lot of fire extinguishers in the Rick Mears pit fire. In later years, they would douse the fire by throwing buckets of water to dilute the alcohol. That was more effective at putting the fire out quickly. They also added a man with a water hose to spray around the fuel receptacle to dilute any alcohol that may have spilled when the refueling hose was pulled out.
In fact, the foam from the fire extinguishers completely blocked the main straightaway to the point that the any drivers going on the main straightaway would have been completely blinded for a lap or two, which is one reason the caution flag should have been thrown for that pit fire (another is the number of safety personnel and equipment that were used in the fighting of that fire).
RIP Bobby Unser
I going to watch this many times over. The cars -engine sounds, crowds.....listened to the race with just the audio....those were the best times and races. ABC and the announcer s.
Mario got screwed, even the announcers knew what Bobby did was illegal.
57:58 The interscope chassis of Danny Ongais looked so unique back in the 1980s
Gurney Eagle?
@@SolamenteVees yes
1981. My favourite Indianapolis 500 of all time apart from many others. And in my opinion the most controversial.
I think you'll find a lot of people who agree with you on the "controversial" part. After all was said and done, Bobby Unser was the winner, but the fight over whether or not he was subject to a penalty left such a bad taste in his mouth that he retired from racing (well, driving _in_ races; he did later go into the commentary booth). Can't say I blame him.
Darn!!!! I Was Hoping To Watch The 'Sunday Night 🌙 At The Movies!!!!"🎬 😳🥴😷🙄😅😂🤣😁🤠😎🤓☺Sunday, February 20, 2022!😳🥴😷🙄😅😂🤣😁🤠😎🤓☺
53:27 the Rick Mears pit fire.
Scary stuff.
I sat in the southwest vista of turn one and saw the huge clouds of smoke & fire retardant
Just watching it yet again...good God was that terrifying
Early 80s had the best looking indycars imo. Now they are butt ugly
lol yeah really miss these angular match boxes
Best sounding engines too. The howl of a Cosworth DFX at full song...
1:04:56 Most inappropriate music ever
Disco era!
You realize that's a ABC commercial. Has nothing to do with the race
Steve O'Connor
Endstage disco
thought the same thing - the unfortunate timing of the driver just being taken to hospital... then... CELEBRATION TIME CMON !!
Some producer was doing the Jean Luc Picard facepalm that day
1:04:53 Danny Ongais leaves motionless in an ambulance with the viewer thinking he's dead.
ABC five seconds later: "🎶Celebrate good times, c'mon!!🎶"
The problem is that the commercials were "racked" to play in a certain order. With it being 1981, there may not have been time to slip that spot to a later time.
@@almostfm And of course, the first thing that played during that particular break was a promo for ABC's Monday Night Baseball, and of course, MLB went on strike shortly after the race (the original strike deadline was for five days after this race was run, but was extended two weeks to June 12, when the MLB players went out on strike).
For some strange reason, the Indianapolis 500 always seemed to reflect the times, and 1981 was certainly right on cue, whether it was the post-qualifying controversy involving Jerry Sneva and Jerry Karl, Karl getting arrested at IMS on Carb Day, resulting in veteran Bob Harkey having to practice Karl's car (Karl was released and drive in the race). Then of course, before the two major controversies, there was the botched start, when seven cars passed the S/F line BEFORE the green flag came out, and then during the caution for Don Whittington's crash, both Tom Sneva and Bill Whittington passed the pace car in anticipation of a restart that never happened (neither driver was penalized because they let the pace car repass them, so no advantage was gained). And that was all before the Mears pit fire, which should have brought out the caution, but didn't, and the controversy regarding Bobby Unser and Mario Andretti both passing cars leaving the pits during the caution for Gordon Smiley's crash (Unser passed 8 and Andretti passed 3, though Andretti did appear to let the furthest forward of the 3 cars her passed repass him).
"33:00" - "35:10" Sam Posey has a very informative and easy to understand explanation,for the layman, about Ground Effects. A little insert for anyone who doesn't know about the effect......like his demo!!
Posey was a terrible driver and an even worse commentator there is a reason he was in the booth and not on the track. Jim McKay was equally as bad.
@@brandond5209
Reading your comments I can see you're a connoisseur of this stuff,so I'd like you to
tell me something about what issues did the ground effect bring into driving on oval raceways,
especially on banked curves.Thx a lot.
@@brandond5209 why don't you drive and commentate
Posey is a Poser.
Nah back home again with Jim neighbors 👌
Poor Dr. Hanna died later that year at 72.