In 1992 A.J. Foyt's racing activity was being heavily bankrolled by U.S. Tobacco via their Copenhagen brand of smokeless tobacco. It was easy to see Foyt was becoming more dependent on Copenhagen's money each May. At first Copenhagen black trim just sort of accentuated the red orange Foyt race cars at Indianapolis. Then Foyt's cars became two tone red orange and black. Next they were painted 60 percent black to 40 percent red orange. Later they were painted black with Foyt orange trim. By the time Foyt did his final "500," his Lola was all black. There's not much A.J. Foyt Coyote red orange to be seen in the photo above. For that matter look. A.J.'s helmet features a contemporary Troy Lee design instead of the familiar red orange.    

Eight years after his final "Indianapolis 500" A.J. Foyt remains, along with Mario Andretti, one of the two biggest heroes and the most recognizable names in the sport of Indy car racing. Unlike Mario however, who hangs around the pits at CART races as a sponsor host for Texaco, Foyt is still a racer with cars in the Indy Racing League and NASCAR Winston Cup. That's not to say Mario doesn't deserve his current status as an elder statesman, but he isn't a player any longer and Foyt is. 

A.J. Foyt was one of the best. When he was at his prime during the period from 1961 through 1964 there was no one better. A.J. Foyt knew more ways to win races than any driver I can think of. He wasn't always the fastest but he was the fastest when he had to be. I always felt that Parnelli Jones was naturally faster than Foyt. But A.J. seemed to know more about the cars. Jones raced his cars as fast as he could for as long as the car could take it, which was often far short of  the race distance. Foyt knew how to manage his cars and competition. He could size up a race in an instant. This skill allowed A.J. to create opportunities for himself by knowing exactly what was going on and what was likely to occur. The result was A.J. Foyt had more success as a racing driver than Parnelli Jones.

I think the accident in January 1965 at Riverside for the NASCAR race took its toll on A.J. Foyt. His back was hurt badly. A.J. came back to win more Indy car races than anyone else during the 1965 season and he was Jim Clark's only serious threat at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in May. Still I believe A.J. Foyt was maybe only 90 percent of what he'd been during his fabulous 1964 season when he won ten of 13 Indy car races (can you imagine that) for the season. In June 1966 when he was burned at Milwaukee that took him down a few more notches. 1966 if you recall, was the season that Mario Andretti began to emerge as the driver to beat on a more often than not basis.

A lot of A.J. Foyt's success in the years when he first climbed to the top in American racing can be credited to George Bignotti. Foyt won the 1961 "Indianapolis 500" and the 1964 "Indianapolis 500" with Bignotti. George was the master in the 1960's, 1970's and even the early 1980's at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. You might say he was the "main man" at Indianapolis in his day just as Roger Penske became "top dog" after Bignotti faded from the scene. If someone was driving for Bignotti during George's time at the top, they had a good chance to win the race. I'm confident Al Unser, Gordon Johncock and Tom Sneva will agree they were in good shape racing cars prepared by George Bignotti more often than not.  

Foyt and Bignotti had a volatile partnership. There were reportedly a lot of  fights and arguments during their association over who was boss. Foyt and Bignotti split sometime during the 1965 season. After that Foyt went in another direction. A.J. hired Johnny Pouleson who had been Parnelli's mechanic on the Agajanian team, but that didn't last long. By 1967 Foyt was building his own orange Coyotes and his dad was running the crew, at least while A.J. was driving.

1967 saw Foyt win his third "Indianapolis 500" and his fifth Indy car title. Foyt had to beat Mario Andretti in the season finale at Riverside to win the championship however. Within two weeks of his third Indianapolis win A.J. teamed with Dan Gurney to win the 24 Hours of Le Mans for Ford Motor Company. Foyt was a terrific road racer and I'm confident he would've been successful in Formula One during the 1960's and early 1970's.

Foyt carried on competitively for the next four seasons with his cigar shaped orange Coyote - Fords at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and in the other USAC Indy car events. When the big wings were introduced at Indianapolis in 1972 the Foyt team began to flounder. Not only that but A.J. got hurt again the day after the 1972 "500" in a USAC dirt car (we call them Silver Crown cars now) race at DuQuoin, Illinois which kept him on the sidelines for part of the season.

Foyt got together with long time racing engineer Bob Riley to build a new T- nosed Coyote for the 1973 season. The new car's debut wasn't much and Foyt was the 32nd fastest qualifier at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in May 1973. The slump didn't last long however. I went to Pocono International Raceway in July 1973 with my old racing pal Dave Willmuth. When leader Roger McCluskey ran out of fuel on the final lap of the Pocono 500 miler there was A.J. Foyt riding along in second place waiting to take another win.

By 1974, Foyt's Coyote powered by what used to be called the Ford DOHC turbo V8 engine, was one of the fastest cars. A.J. called his power plant a Foyt V8 after buying out the Ford Indy car inventory in 1970. I guess that shows how the pace of racing technology has quickened. Can you imagine someone racing the same Indy car for six years in a row in this era? 

With the Coyote - Foyt package Foyt won his record setting "Indianapolis 500" in 1977. He was still racing the Coyote and winning in 1978. By season's end A.J. decided to replace his trusted old car with a new chassis designed by John Barnard and built ironically by Parnelli Jones using Cosworth V8 power. Foyt began racing the new car that season. 

It was sometime around 1978 that Foyt began to reduce his racing. He'd become interested in thoroughbred race horses in the early 1970's. By the end of the decade A.J. was skipping races to be with his horses. From that point on Foyt's driving declined. It was as if he no longer cared if he won or not. Perhaps it was finally becoming the first four-time winner of the "Indianapolis 500" after trying for ten years that changed Foyt. Also A.J. seemed to resist the ever increasing technology that was creeping into racing. I don't think he ever employed an engineer, someone like Morris Nunn who's become so crucial to success in the current era.  

He continued to race and returned to full time racing during the 1980's about the time he became bored with horse racing. The big accident he had in the CART race at Road America in September  1990 ended Foyt's driving career for all intents and purposes. But the tough old guy fought to make it back to the "Indianapolis 500" in 1991 and qualified second. That's remarkable! 

When I began this piece I had a particular A.J. Foyt memory in mind. It wasn't the famous duel with Eddie Sachs in the 1961 "500" which brought A.J. his first win in the big race. It wasn't his sizzling battle with Parnelli Jones on the way to his second Indianapolis win in 1964. It wasn't the way he made his way through the wreckage on the main straightway at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, that stood between he and the checkered flag and a record tying third "500" win in 1967. It wasn't even Foyt's ride around the Speedway in the pace car with Tony Hulman after becoming the first four-time "500" winner. It wasn't his win in the 1972 "Daytona 500" or Le Mans in 1967. It wasn't any of his classic Indy car wins at places like Phoenix, Milwaukee, Michigan or Pocono. 

This memory comes from a night in early September 1964 at the Indiana State Fairgrounds one mile dirt oval.

USAC used to have a stock car series. For its time it was a reasonably big deal. In fact USAC was paying better purses at many of its stock car races in the 1960's than NASCAR promoters could afford. Some of the big name "Indianapolis 500" drivers would show up for the USAC stock car races to make a few extra dollars. Sam Hanks, Troy Ruttman, Tony Bettenhausen (the father), Rodger Ward, Eddie Sachs, Len Sutton, Foyt, Parnelli Jones,  Jim Hurtibise, Roger McCluskey, Mario Andretti and the Unser brothers came to race with the drivers who only ran the stock cars. NASCAR great Fred Lorenzen was a two-time USAC stock car champion before he joined NASCAR in 1961. Another NASCAR star Paul Goldsmith spent a few seasons running the "Indianapolis 500" and the USAC stock car circuit. For it's time USAC stock car racing ranked somewhere between ASA and Winston Cup, something that had potential but was still a poor stepchild of the "Indianapolis 500."  

Two of the more prominent USAC stock car specialists were Norm Nelson and Don White. They were good racers too. Both Nelson and White could've been good in NASCAR, but they chose to race in the Midwest and stayed with USAC most of their careers. Ramo Stott, Terry Ryan, Sal Tovella, Bay Darnell and Elmer Musgrave (Ted's dad) were longtime USAC stock car competitors too. I believe Rusty Wallace did some racing in the USAC series just before it stopped operating, but I can't recall any specifics.  

My buddy John Dailey loved the USAC stock car series. John's favorite was Nelson, who came from Racine, Wisconsin. Norm won the stock car title many times. I don't know how many times because USAC doesn't carry historical data on its website. Let's just say Nelson won a lot of them. Nelson ran with the factory supported Zecol Lubaid team from Milwaukee in Fords, for a few seasons. Then Nelson joined up with Chrysler Corporation and ran Plymouths for many years from his own shop. Boy did John Dailey ever love those Plymouths! 

In 1964 A.J. Foyt was running a Dodge prepared by Ray Nichols of Highland, Indiana. Nichols had been involved with Indy car racing for many years until his driver Pat O'Connor was killed on the first lap of the 1958 "Indianapolis 500." A.J. won the "Firecracker 400" in July in one of the red Nichols Dodges. Paul Goldsmith and Len Sutton were also part of the Nichols team in 1964.

Beginning in 1962 USAC held a 100 lap stock car race on the mile dirt at the Indiana State Fairgrounds on the final night of the Indiana State Fair. The race was called the "State Fair Century." The event ran through the early 1970's. Al Unser won the event a couple times.

I remember sitting on the roof of one of the horse barns, at the fairgrounds, outside turn one during the 1962 race. I think one of Nichols' cars, which were Pontiacs at the time, won the race that night and I believe Goldsmith was driving. I can also remember Rodger Ward, who'd won his second "Indianapolis 500" that May, driving a baby blue Pontiac for Nichols. Ward's car carried the name of a car dealer in Glen Ellyn, Illinois on the sides, in the inaugural "Sate Fair Century" event.

I went to this race the first three or four years it ran. In 1964 Foyt failed to qualify for some reason. I think he lost an engine or might've crashed. Anyway he didn't make the show. His Nichols teammate Sutton was pulled from the car and replaced with Foyt, but A.J. had to start at the rear of the field. I believe there were 24 cars in the race. For the sake of comparison, in 1964 there were a lot of races on the NASCAR schedule where they didn't have 24 cars at the race track.

From what I remember Foyt had a strong field in front of him on the grid. Bobby Marshman, who'd been giving A.J. fits that summer in the Indy cars, was racing. So were Rodger Ward, Nelson and White. In fact Ned Jarrett (yes the Ned Jarrett) was racing at the fairgrounds that night in his blue number 11 Ford. I know that because I got Ned's autograph after the race. I also believe Paul Goldsmith was in the field too.

Another big team in USAC stock cars was the Bill Stroppe team which ran white, orange and metallic blue Mercurys. Parnelli Jones was the headliner on the Stroppe team and he was almost as tough in a stock car as he was in one of the front engine Indy roadsters being built by A.J. Watson at the time. The previous May John Dailey and I sat on the roof of a car and watched Parnelli and NASCAR's Fred Lorenzen put on a fierce battle around the 2.5 mile road circuit, at Indianapolis Raceway Park in the "Yankee 300" event which ran for a few years at IRP. I believe Lorenzen won that race. But it became apparent early in the 1964 "State Fair Century" that Parnelli was the guy to beat in his Mercury.

I can still sort of visualize the atmosphere of the night. It was one of those warm late summer nights with a calm breeze and a bright moon about like it is as I write this. I was in the beginning of my senior year at Carmel High School. In a few weeks my life would be turned upside down when my father walked out on the family for a time. The Vietnam war was becoming worrisome as the Gulf of Tonkin crisis had occurred a few weeks earlier but it wasn't the leading news story every day yet.

Less than one week earlier I'd been on the other side of the fairgrounds race track (I was in the infield) and watched the Beatles perform on on the scoring stand on the main straightway of the fairgrounds dirt mile oval. My pal Bill Correll and I were seated far from the stage and the Beatles looked like bugs in bright light. But we still got the sense of excitement as the stage was surrounded by police, with the fairgrounds grandstands exploding with flashbulbs and shaking with the screams of frenzied girls going crazy. 

Despite the screams and hysterics we could still make out most of the songs in the Beatles' repertoire; "Twist and Shout," "Can't Buy Me Love," "If I Fell," "All My Loving," "A Hard Days Night," "Don't Bother Me," "Please Please Me," "She Loves You," "Things We Said Today," "Boys" and "Long Tall Sally." That was quite an experience because remember in September 1964 the Beatles were among the most famous people in the world. I was still thinking about the Beatles show as the race got underway. 

I don't recall exactly how the race developed and my vantage point in the infield wasn't that good either. But what I do remember was seeing Foyt come through the field as dust from the race track filled the air. Damn I wish I had some statistics. I need to call Donald Davidson because now I'm curious about the actual sequence of events that night at the fairgrounds.

What I could see was Foyt's red Dodge (the number might've been 47 or 49 if I recall correctly) picking off one car after another as he moved through the field. The fairgrounds mile has never invited passing either. It's not that wide and 1964 model cars were big. A.J. had to be using all his skills to move to the front from last place but he was getting there.

Finally, and I don't remember what lap it was Foyt had to overcome the final obstacle, Parnelli's Jones Mercury. A.J. followed Parnelli down the straights and kept looking for a way around, high, low, into the corner and off the corner. This was great stuff, two of the best guys to ever sit in a race car going at it for all they were worth on a dusty mile oval in a race that most people would forget about quickly.

Not many laps from the end Foyt finally found a way to get by Parnelli and he took the checkered flag as race winner. Obviously this wasn't one of A.J.'s most notable victories and since I'm short on actual details it would seem as if it wasn't that important to me. It's one of those things like the final game of the 1980 NBA championship finals. I don't recall Magic Johnson's actual statistics as the Los Angeles Lakers beat the Philadelphia 76ers to take the title. What I do remember is that Magic had one of the best games I've seen by an individual player. In this case what I most remember is watching A.J. Foyt coming from the back of the field to first place in a show of grit and determination. More importantly his last to first win in the 1964 "State Fair Century" is an enduring image I have of A.J. Foyt as a racing driver.   

Watching Foyt in his later years, gruff, overweight and limping from racing injuries, I can still visualize a lean, handsome 29 year old Texan who was "in charge" of American racing in 1964. It makes me think about what it would be like if A.J. Foyt were in his prime as a racing driver today. John Dailey keeps drawing parallels between Foyt and Stewart. I agree. I think Tony is more like Foyt than any driver I've seen, both in terms of driving talent and personality. I only wish we still had Tony Stewart in the Indy Racing League and especially in the "Indianapolis 500."    

In 1964 A.J. Foyt was racing everywhere. One weekend he'd be in a USAC Indy car race. On another weekend he'd be racing sports cars somewhere. After that he might go south and kick butt in NASCAR and show up next in Terre Haute in a sprint car. In each race he'd be the man to beat in order to win the race. 

A.J. Foyt was never my personal favorite. I didn't like it when he won nearly everything in 1964. Actually about the only time I ever felt a lot of emotion about a Foyt victory was at the 1977 "Indianapolis 500" when he became the first four time race winner. It was still a pleasure however to watch an artist like Foyt perform in a race car and what an artist he was in 1964.