1993 NIGEL MANSELL FIRST TEST IN A INDYCAR
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 7 ก.พ. 2025
- 1993 NIGEL MANSELL FIRST TEST IN A INDYCAR at firebird international raceway phoenix........Despite being world champion, Mansell had a falling out with Williams. In his autobiography Mansell writes that this was because of a deal made at the previous Hungarian Grand Prix, which Williams reneged on, and the prospect of Frenchman Alain Prost joining the Renault-powered team.
Williams had neglected to tell Mansell that Prost had signed for 1993 at only the second race of the 1992 season in Mexico, a position that Mansell felt would be similar to their days together at Ferrari. To boot, Williams had Senna offering to drive the second car for free (although Senna found later he couldn't due to Prost having a clause in his contract allowing him to veto the move) and decided that there was little sense in paying the high fees Mansell went on to demand. With the original offer revoked Mansell had his nose put out of joint, with no teams near the might of Williams he decided that enough was enough. An eleventh hour offer was made to Mansell at the Monza Grand Prix but by then the damage was done, Mansell retired from F1.
Mansell consequently left to join the Newman/Haas CART team in 1993. He took over the seat of Michael Andretti, who coincidentally had left CART to race in Formula One for McLaren. At the season opener at Surfers Paradise, Australia, he became the first "rookie" to take pole position and win his first race. A few weeks later however, he suffered a substantial crash at the Phoenix International Raceway, severely injuring his back. At the '93 Indianapolis 500, Mansell would lead the race only to finish third after losing the lead to Emerson Fittipaldi and Arie Luyendyk after a poor re-start. Mansell would go on to score five wins for the 1993 CART season, which, with more high-placed finishes, was good enough to earn him the championship. This enabled Mansell to become the only driver in history to hold both the Formula One and CART championships at the same time. Mansell's victory over Mario Andretti and other American drivers, coupled with 1991 CART champion Michael Andretti's failed sojourn into F1, was seen by many as evidence of superiority of non-US drivers.
Following this successful season in CART, Mansell received several awards including a Gold Medal from the Royal Automobile Club and the 1993 ESPY Award for Best Driver.
His Newman/Haas car was much less reliable the following year, 1994, and results suffered. It was during this season that Mansell "wore out his welcome" in the United States with glimpses of rude behavior, particularly after he was knocked out of the Indianapolis 500. After the crash, he stormed out of the track hospital, and refused medical care. When a reporter asked Mansell if he had spoken with Dennis Vitolo, the driver who had crashed into him, Mansell replied, "you speak to him." Subsequently, Mansell was set to sign autographs at a K-mart (the primary sponsor of his car), but due to a lack of demand, the event was cancelled. Mansell was also the catalyst for the breakdown in the relationship between himself and Mario Andretti. Mario has since remarked "I guess if Ronnie Peterson was the best team-mate I ever had, Nigel Mansell was the worst" and "I had a lot of respect for him as a driver, but not as a man"
Lived next door to him in Jersey UK for s few years. I was out washing my motorbike one day and he came up the driveway and just started chatting away. Complete gentleman
Does Nigel still live in Jersey ??
@@sen5908 I believe so house at the end of the point in st brelades
One person I would love to meet, was going to go too his museum last year, as you could meet him that day, but couldn't get a flight there and back in the same day , was gutted !
Nigel Mansel probably the most unrated rated driver ever
Nigel Mansell is a living legend.
One of the greatest drivers of all time.
A humble man but one of the toughest ever. A true English gentlemen 🇬🇧
This is how Nigel was/is. I can still remember his first oval circuit test. the first lap - he was fast. the second lap - he broke the lap record. the third lap - he broke the lap record again. the fourth lap - he hit the wall.
Yeah I remember that oval test and his debut at oval racing where everyone just marvelling at they were witnessing. Nigel taking so many different lines that other more experienced Indi car drivers wouldn't dare to take.
These 90s indycars were real beasts. I loved the look of the Newman Haas cars.
1993 Indycars looked the best
1,000 BHP!!!
The only time I watch INDYCAR a season long because of Mansell.
Same here. Mansell was brilliant.
I loved Mansell's uncompromising style.
Your loss lol
Same as that 🤣
Same here also but then kept going a few more years with Villeneuve, Zanardi and the first wins of Blundell but then lost interest as I do not remember of Montoya in Indycar. Only get to know of the latter in 2001 with Williams.
This would have been Michael Andretti's car, would have given him a dominant championship year for sure. Great shape of that era compared to today's cars. Great vid.
Poor andretti kept crashing and has ronfo back to karting. He was oit of shape and McClaren had to get a chef in to put him on a diet
I was glad to see Mansell come over here and succeed in winning the CART title right after winning the 1992 WDC. He was another welcomed talent that boosted the popularity of CART outside of the US & Canada, not to mention to get some of my fellow American *so-called race fans* to pay attention to the foreign talent - namely from F1.
Michael Andretti on the other hand *only proved that if a driver is going to F1 he had better be more conditioned to take on the task seriously* and *expect to stay committed to it.*
Gotta love how Murray Walker over exaggerates everything. 'Smashed' the record lap by one tenth of a second :P
A tenth is ten times more than what he could've beaten the time by. Id agree with Murray.
Well...car never driven, track never seen...
Murray was passionate about racing and it excited him so much ...far more than todays boring as hell commentators (looking at you, Croft.. you useless clown). I miss Murray a great deal, he could even make a boring race sound exciting.
One of the all time greats
it would have been interesting but I think mansell was unstoppable that year & he was hungary for success after the way he got treated in formula one
it was an exciting time for Indy Car, no two ways about it. Saw him test at Mid Ohio on a very nice day for $5 in 93.
OMG!!! I was there!!! I worked at the Bondurant driving school next door, and we’d sneak over there to watch Mansell test! One of our other instructors is the guy with the yellow shirt riding with Mansell in the Cadillac. (I think it was Terry Borcheller.) Nigel gave his pit crew a deck of playing cards and said “don’t worry bout me, mates! And he just went out and drove. And drove. And drove. He was a cool dude.
No matter if F1 or IndyCar Nigel felt home in both.
Those 93 Indy cars were faaaaaaaasssssst
It was a great day. Penske team, Newman Haas, a lot of teams were there on a beautiful day. We were in the balcony overlooking the pits and my friend said "that's Nige right there on the concrete pit wall".
A malaise era Cadillac full of passengers, driven in anger by Mansell. Absolutely wonderful, never knew that footage existed.
mansell was a genius
Mansell looked nervous until he got into the car, then looked quite happy. :)
That’s the dustiest, dirtiest, track I’ve ever seen a professional be made to test on. I was more a Penske team fan at the time, but Nigel was truly one of the great open wheel drivers of his generation.
Well it is in the desert, so. 😂😂
@@Ever443 so is Abu Dhabi F1, yet its perfectly clean.. even back then, no F1 car would have ever gone on such a dirty track in the 90ies..
Great Indy season. Hope Indy become great again.
still the best looking cars!
Brilliant video thanks for posting
Some pretty disparaging comments here, based in ignorance or perhaps something worse.
Firebird was not built as a spectator venue so it isn't fancy. I've driven there - it's a nice road course where a fast car can stretch its legs.
Most if not all of the Champcar teams did winter testing there - Penske was testing the same day this was filmed. There is also a YT video of Senna testing a Penske that was filmed at this track just a couple weeks earlier.
Because everyone in Champ car plus a who's who of open wheel talent had tested Champ cars there, breaking the lap record wasn't a trivial thing. Breaking it the first time out in a new type of car on a track he'd never seen before is even more impressive!
RIP Murray Walker
hauling ass in a caddilac.. that was a novel idea back in 93 :D
People talk such BS about mansell like he had the fastest cars so of course he won. He was fast anyway regardless! Winning back to back in f1 and indy should have silenced those critics. Look at 2024 and the f1 drivers that didn't win the world championship or even races when their car was fastest at certain circuits. You still have to be world class to win these things.
Loved that era and watching Mansell, Piquet, Prost, Senna - what an era!
Nigel was great. Immediately winning in Indy. Shouldn’t be any doubt about his greatness.
The SOUND 😱 ❤️ just like the 80's F1 turbo cars 🎶🎶🎶
the lola looked so damn good!
Still one of my favourite all time race cars.
the cars looked great back then
back in the 90,s when indy and f1 cars sounded and looked so good
Still.amazes.me to this day that he went to America and won the Championship in the first year of trying!! Just unbelievable
Absolute glory days of Indy cars. Gorgeous car.
Unlinke now, Indy cars look like they've eaten a few too many big macks lol
Nige is loved here in Aussieland I still have a signed Williams shirt from him at the Pt Adelaide Football Club "the Moustachioed Lion"
Back when Indy Car was important. Hopefully Alsonso's presence will lend it some gravitas.
Safe to say it didn't 😀
@@TheToonMonkey It did to a certain degree, but it didn't have the same impact that Mansell's had.
Let's face it. The man could drive anything...that yellow and blue Williams still the best.
Back then CART was the top American racing series. With guys like Fittipaldi and Mansell a lot of other Europeans (like Zanardi) and South Americans all tried CART, which by the mid 90's became much less an "American sport" than it had been prior to that. Add the Indy Racing League split and suddenly more and more American viewers tuned into Nascar.
Besides, oval racing was never Mansell's forte.
What on earth are you on about? Mansell dominated the ovals. He won 4 out of the 6 oval races that year, more than anyone had ever done in a single season before. He was better on the ovals than he was on the road courses.
@@duffman18 based
6:00 Greg Norman standing on top of the truck like the risen Christ
4:47 love seeing the difference between highway speed and race car speed.
Я из-за Менселла начал смотреть Формула 1 и IndyCar 👌
haha nice. I was at his first indy car race on the gold coast...
MarkMash17 You lucky fucker.
I was there too. 10 years old and at the beginning of my motorsport addiction. The good Old days
@@aliceisadog1 think I must have been the same age...
Dirty track. No rubber down. Blown tyres after that spin test. And still broke the track record. What a driver. Hardly ‘smashed’ tho. Murray. Ha
I read earlier this year there are now only 3 K-Mart stores left in America
Nice Woolly, Greg Norman! :D
He must have thought he was back in Kyalami with all that dust everywhere on this go-kart track.
I'm Brazilian, but I'm a big fan of Nigel Mansell.....
Nice to hear that. As British Mansell fan I can say that, although I perhaps disliked them at the time because of the intense rivalry with Nigel, I have the utmost respect and admiration for Piquet and Senna now. Senna was utterly brilliant in a way that the Hamilton GOAT fanboys will never understand.
he still IS pretty awesome.
smoked the top gear lap he did.
Nice video...Nigel Mansell tries to drive 92' Caddy fast....92' Caddy says "NOPE". :)
I really have to raise eyebrow at that circuit being called "international"
Do u think that means theres also right hand turns? :P
Have to disagree with you on the ovals point. In his championship year 4 out of 5 wins were on ovals and the only one he didn't win was Indy where he came third.
He 'smashed' the lap record. By 1/10 of a second!
Thanks from Newman-Haas racing team my sympathy for Paul Newman and old cinema was born.
the cadillac must have felt like driving the williams fw12
Those are my favorite Indy Cars.
Current ones just don’t look as mean as these 30 year old ones.
That was the last real IndyCar
best sounding car ever
on the ovals he could go like hell just a maniac lol
This guy never got the proper recognition for what he did f1 champ and indy car champ in the same season.
Lol, he wasn't used to 10 codes yet. That's Nigel, always funny.
I didn't know a Cadillac could do that 0_0.
Lovely! Just lovely! .18"
Greg "I will just be up here guys"
Was that Rowan Atkinson he was shooing away so he could talk to Greg Norman at 1:43?
This story doesn't mention that a few years later Williams and Mansell patched up their differences and Mansell briefly returned to the team during the 1994 F1 season as team mate to Damon Hill. When Hill was pushed off the track at the last race of the season in Adelaide, to settle the championship for the German, guess who won the race: Mansell. Hill went on to win the championship for Williams a year or two later, but had already been told he'd been fired for the following year. Mansell wasn't the only one to fall foul of Williams management. They made excellent cars then, but the way they handled people left a lot to be desired.
That Cadillac really handles well. Very nimble.
No roll at all.
Miss those cars.
Spin test! :D
RED 5 the lion
That Cadillac handles like a canal barge
Fantástico Mansel
I like that nobody seems to care how insanely dangerous is to have a test track right next to a highway with nothing in between :))
You should see the times in nascar races where they managed to leave the track and land on the public highway next to the track. Happened a few times at Talladega before they reinforced the fences.
The intro was too funny lol
What the Fuk has happened to motorsport? That things unreal!
casey bramley it got watered down by environmentalists sadly
Replaced by other things, video games etc.
No tobacco money
Nigel Mansell is Monster.
@PeterMayer That must have been fun to see.
could this test track be anymore dirtier or dusty?
@pedro7g5 Its where the sponsor overlay is - red band underneath then the white texaco stencilled one over the top
Those were Damn Good Cars
Damn that cadillac can roll!
A tenth of a second... I hardly call that smashing the lap record Murray = D
Spin test?! Wtf is this dude doing with our car?
When Cart was great.
@ArtificialRed1083 Senna did test a Penske
I think that was for show - leverage if u will. Its on youtube.
As a rookie mansell won most of his races on the ovals not the road courses against men like andretti little al & fittipaldi who in their own right are motorsport legends and mansell blew them away in his first season, would mears have lapped them so easy as well ?
TICE123 Yes. Rick Mears on an oval was magical to watch.
I love Nigel Mansell but with thag being said he won almost exclusively on ovals in the fastest car on a super team, he really didn't make f1 look dominant at all.
@@penskepc2374 normally in a super team both drivers do well, what happened to mario ? From what i could see at the time both the penske at the time and Newman Hass where very equal, penske won alot of races
@@kers80bhp Mario won his last CART oval track race in 1993 at Phoenix after Mansell crashed.
@@penskepc2374
Well let's put it this way...
1) Mansell *- with the Right Attitude -* came over to a top CART team immediately after winning the 1992 F1 WDC, took his job seriously enough on numerous circuits that he had not driven on before.... and won the championship.
2) Michael Andretti on the other hand *-with the Wrong Attitude -* ventured off to a top F1 team to initiate his campaign on circuits he had never driven on before. Wasn't as dedicated as Mansell was and it showed when he failed miserably. Having Senna as a teammate is one thing, crashing early on in races - on numerous occasions - is quite another.
That was not a good joint scenario to make a good impression about CART drivers.
So Mansell/F1 won over Andretti/CART on this particular matchup/comparison of the drivers & their respective racing series.
The only notable exception of CART drivers getting it right in F1 during their rookie year was Montoya and Jacques Villeneuve. Even JV couldn't pull it off with the WDC in his first year (understandably) though he did finish 2nd behind his teammate.
*Therefore in that point in time* (early-mid 1990's) it became perfectly clear that F1 was king-of-hill.
Why was everything better back then?
Why is he taping the upper side of his helmet visor??
pedro7g5 to keep the sun out of his face and to keep his eyes focused on things more in front of him.
It's an oddity....F1 drivers can transition into Indy, but Indy drivers can't transition into F1. Why is that? Indy is a beast...it is insane. High stakes, a special skill set. F1 demands a greater all round driving ability I guess. The high speed oval racing is one dimensional...whereas F1 is multi-dimensional...drivers have to continuously dial-in and re-dial in their cars, overtaking is more aggressive, the tracks have more scope for expression of driver and car....the driving skill set is greater for F1 than Indy....???
LOL at the Caddy !
How do they compare to F1 cars ?
They both are open wheel. But the comparisons end there because Formula 1 cars are far more expensive and rely on more advanced technology. Also Formula 1 cars are only designed to race on road and street courses while Indycar aerodynamics are more flexible because they not only race road and street courses but on ovals as well.
@@jamestokyo9154 this was less true in 1993, indycars where significantly more powerful and and extremely advanced, some areas were never open for development like f1 so obviously the tech wasn't there.
When Cosworth was King.
That was good days of the Cart Indy series, with top drivers, 2 of the drivers went to F1, and won the F1 World Championship Back then they had turbo's, and 1100 HP was nothing. I would think on a mile long straight they could hit 300 mph. Mansell at Michigan, was clocked at 252 MPH on the straight. IRL bought it out and made it Nascar/Indy. IT SUCKS!! Very few road courses. Indy back then, raced all over the world. I remember the Mercedes 12 cylinder, made in secret, especially for the Indy 500. They were monsters. The engine is still at mercedes museum. Some say 1500 HP After that they changed the rules..
12 cylinder?? lol what
It was a large displacement V8. Larger displacement because it used pushrods. Banned after winning first time out at Indy.
+TrappenWeisseGuy ; yes the ilmor engine was definitely a V8.
"That was good days of the Cart Indy series, with top drivers, 2 of the drivers went to F1, and won the F1 World Championship" Only Jacques Villenueve managed that. CART champion in 1995 and F1 champion in 1997. Juan-Pablo Montoya never managed that feat. What is your *other* driver??
"Back then they had turbo's, and 1100 HP was nothing. " Utter nonsense. Back in 1993 the CART engines were rated at around 800hp. When Gil de Ferran recorded the all-time fastest lap average speed at Fontana in 2000 the Honda produced 940hp according to Honda themselves.
You're *obviously* confusing the F1 turbo era of the 80's with CART. In 1986 there still was no boost limit so the tops used 4,0+ bars of boost and BMW even managed 5,6 bars. According to BMW their straight 4 turbo produced 1400+ hp on the dyno and probably more because the dyno only went to 1400.
"Mansell at Michigan, was clocked at 252 MPH on the straight." Source please, I have tried googling about that and nothing comes up. Nothing. Knowing the validity of the rest you say I think it's fair to assume you just heard this somewhere and believed it.
" I would think on a mile long straight they could hit 300 mph." Not with open wheel cars they wouldn't. Hate to say this but the power required to overcome drag increases cubely (8 times) with twice the speed. You'd need 2000 hp at the very least - especially since these cars with their open wheels and wings have a lot of drag. They're not land speed record cars.
" Indy back then, raced all over the world." No, you're yet again confusing it with F1. The only non-North American Indycar races were in Brazil. That's it. Seriously, are you for real or a troll?
"I remember the Mercedes 12 cylinder, made in secret, especially for the Indy 500." Well then you clearly don't remember. The Mercedes 500I was a 3,43 liter (209,3 cui) pushrod V8. It was a crude design Mercedes only built because an old rule which allowed pushrod engines with merely two valves per cylinder to A) Have a larger displacement of 3,43 liters vs 2,65 for the DOHC engines and B) Run a higher boost in the races. 27 PSI was allowed for the pushrod engines vs 22PSI for the DOHC engines. Why? Because the limitations of the old pushrod design and since it clearly was handicaped they granted it some benefits back in the day those actually tried running one. Nobody did - except for Mercedes who designed a bespoke unit just for this to exploit this overlooked rule, which was in place for all those (hardly any) wanting to enter bulky pushrod stock blocks to race at Indy.
"Some say 1500 HP" Some are *full of it*. Mercedes rated this engine at 1024 hp "peak power" - as in what they saw on the dyno and ideal trim. Previously they had rated this engines at "roughly 1000hp". Where this 1500hp number comes from I can only guess. Insane exaggeration.
Anyways, 27 PSI of boost equals 1,86 bars. The regular Indycars were allowed 22 PSI of boost or 1,52 bars.
Honda used 4,0 bars in the 1986-1987 turbo F1 engines. That's 58 PSI
BMW reportedly used 5,6 bars of boost for the Benetton-BMW in 1986. That's 81 PSI. Or 165 inches of mercury.
Mercedes hasn't designed a 12 cylinder racing engine since the 1930's, check up the W154 racing car from 1938.
I'm not sure you're actually serious. If you are rename yourself Mr. Confused Bits-and-pieces.
TheIronDuke W. Didn't Nigel Mansell race at Surfers Paradise in 93? That's in Australia, so just wanted to say that in case you'd forgotten..
.. but as for everything else you say, I agree with everything!! He is talking utter nonsense and school playground chitter-chatter that people like to throw around, with obscure numbers that they don't understand.
Nigel would have killed it in nascar
Nascar would never allow a F1/ single seat driver to show them up!
juan pablo montoya.......??
William Hendrix -Right on..
No he wouldn't off, nascar is by far the hardest of the 3.
Mansell actually met Dale Earnhardt that year, and Dale asked him if he wanted to take a pay cut and race with them the next year. Such a shame it never happened. Nascar racing is so different from any other motorsport. As a brit I've been getting into nascar recently. Cos there's nothing like it. F1 drivers mostly struggle in nascar because it's such a different style of racing, especially restrictor plate races where every car has identical speed and so the entire grid races as one big pack, rows and rows of 3 wide cars, it's like rush hour traffic jam but at 190 mph where a single tiny error by one driver can wipe out half the field. It becomes a lot more about drafting than anything else. There's always last lap passes because you're better off being in 2nd place going into the last lap so that you can use drafting to overtake the leader. But yeah in restrictor plate races, the driver in last place is usually only a second or two behind the race leader at any one time, which makes the whole thing pretty insane. It's great
If anyone could adapt though, it'd be mansell. When nigel and Dale met each other, they revealed they were both huge fans of each other. Would have been so cool to see them race each other. Oh well, it can never happen now
he is a fantastic driver!
Wish i could be in the back seat of that cadillac 🙈😂
indycar today looks like HIV plus compared to this. That Newman Haas car looked like a freaking F15 Eagle fighter
When will Indycar be at this level again where they can snatch the F1 world champion?
"Spin test" No Maury he was doing donuts
Nutty Nigel lol
This was probably the first time Mansell had driven a formula car with a manual gearbox in five years, since 1988.（u＾ω＾）
6:07 Greg Norman never dramatic
5:06 "Test" oh please. He clearly lost his nerve and spun completely out of control
Baloney.
Jeremy never drove a Cady around the track like that.
Caddysong; We are sailing - we are sailing...