By Dick Mittman
indy500.com

Wednesday, October 8, 2003

There's been a Bob Clidinst involved with racing at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway since President Franklin Delano Roosevelt took office in 1933.

That's 70 years and counting.

Robert Clidinst Sr. was chief mechanic for Shorty Cantlon when Louis Meyer earned his second Indianapolis 500 victory in 1933. Robert Clidinst Jr. worked for the Speedway public relations department this past season when Gil de Ferran won the Indianapolis 500, Kevin Harvick the Brickyard 400 and Michael Schumacher the United States Grand Prix.

Between them, they've worked in some capacity at the Speedway through 99 races - 67 Indianapolis 500s, 10 Brickyard 400s, four United States Grands Prix, six IROC at Indy races, eight Porsche Michelin Supercup races, three Ferrari Challenge races and one Freedom 100.

Bob Sr. started when there were riding mechanics and 117-mph speeds at Indy. Bob Jr. started when the roadster still was king, and he has witnessed the move to the highly sophisticated rear-engine machines of today that are capable of 230-mph laps.

Bob Jr. always refers to his late father as "my old pappy" or "Pop." Bob learned about racing hanging around his father's garages at the Speedway and his Cadillac service garage in an alley just north of downtown Indianapolis. Race cars and drivers always seemed to appear at the Cadillac garage, too.

"(He was) known as 'Big Bob' or referred to as the Mad Russian (in the 1930s) by a lot of people around the Speedway," the younger Clidinst said.

"He continued as a chief mechanic through the '30s, through the '50s, and then his health started failing him. He didn't do as much into the '60s, although he was still chief mechanic for (owner) Roy McKay with (driver) Al Keller. And then he worked with Joe Langley in '61 and the car (Bobby) Marshman got co-rookie of the year with."

Some of the other drivers the elder Clidinst was involved with included Chet Miller, George Barringer, Tony Bettenhausen, Duke Dinsmore, Bayliss Levrett, Leroy Warriner and Bob Sweikert.

In 1940, Bob Clidinst Sr. was a mechanic for Joie Chitwood when he took his rookie test. Today, Chitwood's grandson of the same name is senior vice president of business affairs for the Speedway.

Clidinst Jr. was born June 12, 1934, and by the time he was 6 he had a driving desire to attend the race with his father in 1941. But his mother, Ruth, she's now 90 and lives with her son, thought he was too young.

"I stayed at my aunt's house a few blocks from the Speedway," Bob Jr. said. "And I can remember hearing them run and being so mad that I crashed my toy cars against the wall because I couldn't be there to see it first hand."

He's been "mad" about racing ever since. In fact, it is such a passion that he has no feeling for any other sport. There's racing, and that's it.

When the race resumed in 1946 following a track shutdown during World War II, young Clidinst, now almost 12, was allowed to attend his first "500." He hasn't missed one since.

The elder Clidinst would load up the family car with sandwiches and drinks and drive it to the track early in the morning, parking close to the fence. Then the family would ride out on the bus or take the train later in the day, and they'd all drive home after the race.

In high school, Bob Jr. began driving to the track with friends and parked up in the third turn.

Young Bob got his first job at the track as a "stooge" in 1957 when his father was crew chief as Don Edmunds earned Rookie of the Year honors. He also worked with his father in 1960 and 1961, his father's last years working at the Speedway, learning more and more about being a mechanic. His dad also put him to work in the family garage and then would leave his son in charge while attending to duties at the track. Young Bob yearned to be at the track with him.

So, in 1961-62, Clidinst Jr. joined Warriner as his mechanic and traveled the racing circuit for two years.

Bob Jr. picked up another type job at the Speedway in 1963. Promoter Ted Hollingsworth put him to work with Bowes Seal Fast handing out the firm's product and getting signed contracts from the teams that said they would use it in the engines during the race.

The next year Bob Laycock, who had taken over the media room operations at the track from Snappy Ford in 1952, decided to increase his May staff. He brought in Clidinst Jr. and Bill York as his assistants, and both have been there ever since.

Clidinst's duties mainly took place trackside and in the garages, keeping track of statistics and cars and eventually providing information for the historical files. Today he's considered an archivist.

Starting in October 1962, he also began working with the crew that worked at the track whenever there were tire tests going on, whether it be a blustery March or a chilly October day in front of empty grandstands. He loved it.

Clidinst Jr. even got a small part in the 1968 Paul Newman movie "Winning," filmed in part at the Speedway. He was in charge of the fire safety crew when the director asked for extras to be drivers, writers, etc. He volunteered and became driver "Bobby Fake." "Bob" was on the side of his helmet. In the film, he is seen walking with Johnny Rutherford up to Newman in the garage area and greeting him and later again approaching Newman and talking to him the day after he supposedly won the race.

He didn't get paid anything extra for his cameo roles.

Clidinst's real specialty has been model building and detailed drawing of race cars, the engines and components. He started this when he was 6. As he got into the garages with his father, he began to take exacting measurements of the cars and eventually got a job with Monogram Models in Chicago, builder of plastic model cars, in the 1950s.

Throughout his life, he has continued to do freelance work and consulting with companies interest in building a line of die-cast cars or even individuals who want to build a full-sized copy of a famous car. His home files are invaluable.

"I'm in the process of doing some patterns for a model Novi engine that may be used in large-scale models or could just be a desk model on its own," he said.

Clidinst also is called when someone wants to know the color scheme of a particular car of the past. He always had an attentive eye as to how each car was painted and regularly provided this information to the press or anyone else who might need it.

Over the years, Clidinst has been privy to the dramatic and constant climb in speed as the rear-engine car replaced the upright roadster at the Speedway. Often a new speed mark was reached in testing, and only a few people knew about it until it became official during qualifying in May. The 150 barrier was a landmark when Parnelli Jones finally broke it in 1962.

"We saw Mickey Thompson's test and (Jack) Brabham's," Clidinst said.

"And then when Rolla Vollstedt brought the first rear-engine Offy to the Speedway for Len Sutton, that was just unbelievable. He had a 156-mph lap at almost 7 o'clock in the evening, nearly dark, on a March, cool, blustery day. And Sutton only quit that day because he almost hit a dog in the third turn, and they finally gave it up.

"But that was really history being made."

Mark Donohue hiked the speed to 180, and then Tom Sneva took it to the unthinkable 200. Eventually, Scott Brayton and Arie Luyendyk got it up almost 240.

Clidinst, a music fan whose preferences range from classical to ethnic to Ernest Tubb, has a range of favorite drivers starting with Rex Mays, who recognized him as "that Clidinst kid" when he was a 12-year-old running about the garages, to Tony Bettenhausen to Jimmy Bryan.

"And that led to '58 and Foyt coming to the Speedway, and he has been whom I've considered the king ever since," he said.

Clidinst is not one of those old-timers who thinks everything in the past is better. In fact, he considers the racing today much improved and the close finishes make it more appealing.

"Oh, it's much more competitive," he said.

Finally, why didn't he drive a race car himself?

"I did some," he said. "I tried it, but just wasn't very successful." ***

2004 IMS tickets: Tickets and information on all three events in 2004 at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway - the Indianapolis 500, Brickyard 400 and United States Grand Prix - are available by contacting the IMS ticket office at (800) 822-INDY, (317) 492-6700 or logging on to at www.indianapolismotorspeedway.com.

• News Index
• Print This Page
•