By Dick Mittman
indy500.com
Friday, September 10, 2004
German racing superstar Michael Schumacher is having another incredible Formula One season, maybe the best of his remarkable career. So far he has won 12 out of 14 Grand Prix races heading into the Italian Grand Prix on Sept. 12 at Monza.
But American racing legend A.J. Foyt can smirk and say: "So, what's new about that? I did it 40 years ago."
The year 1964 was a season to remember for the man who epitomized the macho era of American racing. It was the final season before rear-engine cars began to take over Indy-car racing.
In 1964, Foyt won the first seven races, including the Indianapolis 500, on the Championship Trail and 10 of 13 total. One of the losses came because Ford talked him into driving a rear-engine car for the first time in the second Milwaukee race, and the transmission broke on the first lap. He led 861 of 1,750 laps competed during the year.
But Foyt's season wasn't limited to just Indy cars. He ventured into NASCAR and won the Firecracker 400 on July 4 at Daytona International Speedway. He started 13 sprint-car races and won five, finishing second or third in four others. He only ran two midget races and finished fifth in one. He also won three of 13 USAC stock-car races he started.
Foyt totaled 19 victories that season in 46 races involving four different series. He finished in the top 10 31 times racing on pavement, dirt, high banks, short tracks, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and a road course.
"It was a great season," Foyt said recently. "Did I feel unbeatable? I think we pretty much were.
"The only time we didn't win in the Indy cars was when we didn't finish the race. Working with George Bignotti was terrific. We respected each other, and we worked hard to win.
"It was a much smaller team back then. I would pull the motors out of the cars, wash the cars down after we raced on dirt. It worked because we worked together."
Bignotti became the master mechanic of Indy-car racing. His drivers won the Indianapolis 500 seven times and season championships six times. Foyt did both for him in 1964.
"We had a pretty good year," said Bignotti, now 88. "We had a clutch start to slip at Trenton, and that was our only malfunction. A.J. ran fast. He was hot, no doubt about it. Not too many could compete with him. Parnelli (Jones) was about the only one to challenge him."
Foyt drove a Watson-built chassis in most of the Champ Car races that season. A.J. Watson became the premier car constructor from the mid-1950s to the time the rear-engine machines took over in the mid-1960s.
"He was one of the great drivers that could win anyplace," said Watson, now 80. "He just got a streak going. He did good, really. I don't know anybody that's done that good in a streak."
Foyt, who today as he closes in on 70 runs his grandson A.J. Foyt IV on the Indy Racing League® IndyCar® Series circuit, started his 1964 season at the Riverside, Calif., road course in a NASCAR stock car on Jan. 19, three days past his 29th birthday, and finished 21st. A week later, he finished second to Don Branson in the first 50-mile sprint car race at Phoenix but later in the day picked up his first victory of the year in a second 50-miler.
He headed to Florida in February to compete in the Daytona 500. He finished fourth in the qualifying race but placed 24th in the main race. An 11th place at Atlanta, again in a NASCAR race, followed March 4. Then it was back to Phoenix to kick off the Champ Car season March 22.
Foyt qualified second to pole sitter Parnelli Jones, blasted by him on the first lap and led all 100 with a record speed of 107.536 mph on the 1-mile track to put his season into high gear. He won nine open-wheel races in a row, Champ Car or sprint, at tracks in Phoenix, Reading, Pa., Williams Grove, Pa., Trenton, N.J., Indianapolis, Milwaukee, Wis., and Langhorne, Pa.
Branson, who beat Foyt in the sprint opener, ended Foyt's string with a sprint victory June 28 at Indianapolis Raceway Park.
The victory in the Indianapolis 500 that year was Foyt's second, with two more to come. He started fifth. Foyt snatched the lead from Parnelli Jones on Lap 55 and led the rest of the way, beating Rodger Ward to the checkered flag by 2.5 seconds.
After Indy, Foyt pushed his Champ Car success streak to seven straight by winning at Milwaukee, Langhorne, Trenton and Springfield, Ill. He also won sprint races at Terre Haute, Ind., and Williams Grove. On July 4, Foyt was down at Daytona again, and this time the NASCAR victory was his as he swept by Bobby Isaac on the final lap to win in a Dodge.
Foyt's victory Aug. 22 at Springfield on the dirt probably was his most spectacular. No driver ever had won seven Champ Car races in a row, and he was forced to start 16th when a faulty magneto sapped his speed during qualifying. Bignotti replaced the mag, and Foyt finally passed Jud Larson for the lead on Lap 65. Bobby Marshman, a runaway leader until he was forced to pit to replace a shredded tire, came on in hot pursuit, but Foyt charged to the finish line first by a wheel.
The end to Foyt's winning streak happened the next day at Milwaukee - in an unfamiliar rear-engine car instead of his customary roadster.
"I drove the rear-engine car at Milwaukee because Ford talked me into it," Foyt said. "I knew we weren't going to be able to beat the manufacturers because they had so much money. So I figured I better start working with them.
"Then the gearbox broke on the first lap, it didn't even last a lap, and our winning streak came to an end. But I knew the rear-engine car was going to be the car once they got the reliability sorted out. That's the way it is when the manufacturers get involved because they pour so much money into it."
Two weeks later on Sept. 7, Foyt was back in the winner's circle at DuQuoin, Ill, for two reasons. First, he rebounded from his first defeat to win the 100-mile race on the dirt. Second, he had clinched the championship with four races to go, the same as Schumacher this year in Formula One.
Foyt closed out the season by winning two USAC stock car races, the Champ Car Hoosier 100 at the Indiana State Fairgrounds, the Champ Car race at Sacramento, Calif., and the season-ending USAC stock car race at Hanford, Calif. He finished second in the second Trenton Champ Car race in September due to a broken clutch and 19th after winning the pole in the closer Nov. 22 at Phoenix because of a spin.
"Foyt in his time was one of the greatest to come along," Bignotti said.
And how does he compare to the Schumacher of today? Both Bignotti and Watson said it was hard to rank them. But Watson gave the edge to Foyt because of his versatility.
"He might have been a little bit better," Watson said. "Don't tell him I said so, though." ***
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