Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, May 30, 1994 TAG: 9405300060
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B5 EDITION: HOLIDAY
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: INDIANAPOLIS LENGTH: Long
So overwhelming was Penske's Mercedes engine that even when Emerson Fittipaldi crashed while leading with 16 laps to go, his teammate, Unser, simply moved in for the victory.
So dominating were the Penske cars that they led for 193 of 200 laps and were 1-2 most of the race.
It's been more than two decades since any engine dominated an Indy 500 so thoroughly.
"Thank you to Mercedes-Benz," said Unser, celebrating his second victory in three years at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. "You know, they made it easy to pass everybody down the straightaway. This is a super car. It went the distance."
Penske, whose elite team has given him a record 10 Indy victories, said, "To be able to deliver the pole as Al did and then come back and win the race is just exactly what we set out to do."
Penske took advantage of a loophole in Indy 500 rules and made a high-stakes gamble, putting millions of dollars into the development of the Mercedes engine for this event.
Sunday's runaway was reminiscent of 1967, when Parnelli Jones - driving Andy Granatelli's revolutionary turbine car - led 170 laps and nearly lapped the field before a $6 part in the gearbox failed and ruined the effort.
During the next two years, the sanctioning U.S. Auto Club effectively legislated the engine out of the race by cutting its horsepower. Nobody would be surprised if the same thing happens to the stock-type, push-rod Mercedes engines that went from the drawing board to the race track in nine months. They gave Penske's drivers an estimated 150-300 more horsepower than the conventional Indy V8s.
The payoff, worth about $1.2 million, came Sunday as Unser added this victory to his triumph in 1992 - the closest finish ever.
For Unser, though, it was more than a victory; it was a birthday gift to his father, Al Unser Sr., who turned 55 on Sunday.
"He said that was the only thing he wanted for his birthday," Al Jr. said.
The victory enhanced the Unser family's Indy resume: Al Sr., who retired two weeks ago, has four victories; Bobby Unser, the uncle of "Little Al," has three victories.
"This is one I'll never forget," Al Sr. said.
Asked if he could have caught Fittipaldi, the winner said, "No. He was running awfully good. Emmo seemed to pull away at will. It was going to be awfully tough."
The crash occurred moments after Unser unlapped himself. Fittipaldi was trying to overtake him and put him a lap down again when he hit the wall.
Unser inherited a 13.3-second lead when Fittipaldi crashed, keeping the race a Penske runaway. He pulled away steadily from rookie runner-up Jacques Villeneuve until a crash by Stan Fox brought out the last of seven caution flags with three laps remaining.
The race was punctuated by crashes, but Fox, who was taken to Methodist Hospital with a cut right elbow, was the only driver who suffered more than bruises.
While it clearly was a Penske-dominated race, there were other storylines to this Indy 500.
Mario Andretti finished the last of his 29 Indy starts in the pits, sitting in his broken car, and 1993 series champion Nigel Mansell nearly was pancaked by rookie Dennis Vitolo during a caution period.
Unser, whose other Indy victory was by a nerve-wracking forty-three-thousandths of a second, was able to relax and enjoy the final moments of this victory, cruising behind the pace car.
Fittipaldi led by nearly a full lap on the 2 1/2-mile oval when his car ran across the rumble strips on the turn 4 apron and slid up the banking, the right rear slapping the wall. Fittipaldi, uninjured, coasted to a stop 70 yards from the finish line as more than 400,000 spectators roared.
Fittipaldi led 145 laps and finished 17th, and the third Marlboro Team Penske car, driven by Paul Tracy, went out with a mechanical problem and finished 23rd.
"It should be 1-2," Fittipaldi said of the Penske team.
Bobby Rahal, driving a 1-year-old Ilmor-powered Penske racer, finished a lap down in third, followed by Jimmy Vasser, Robby Gordon, Michael Andretti and Teo Fabi.
Villeneuve, the youngest driver in the race at 23 and the son of the late Formula One star Gilles Villeneuve, led the other seven laps.
On the seventh lap, Vitolo pulled off a spectacular feat, doing a 360-degree spin coming off turn 4, getting the car back under control and driving on as the first caution flag came out.
Roberto Guerrero spun on lap 22 as he drove into traffic through the short-chute straightaway at the south end of the oval. He slid backward more than 1,000 feet, losing speed, before tapping the wall. He walked away from the crash.
The leaders, including Mario Andretti, who had been running fourth, made their first pit stops during the ensuing caution period.
Andretti, the 1969 race winner whose bad luck since has reached legendary proportions, sat frustrated in his car while his crew worked frantically on an ignition problem. Finally, they gave up. Andretti, retiring at the end of the season from Indy-car racing, emerged sadly from the car to a huge cheer. He unofficially finish 32nd.
"It's a big letdown, especially when it's something as stupid as this," Andretti told the crowd, which rewarded him with a chant of "Mario! Mario! Mario!"
"The emotion that I felt from the crowd just made all these years worthwhile in every way. It almost overcame all these disappointments," Mario said.
Meanwhile, on lap 30, there was a crash in turn 1 when Dominic Dobson and Mike Groff hooked wheels. Groff's crew said their driver first touched wheels with Lyn St. James. It then appeared Dobson pinched down on Groff.
After the two came together, Dobson's car veered into the wall, hitting hard, rear first, then slid along the wall. Groff's car spun and came up to the wall, hitting it lightly and sliding into Dobson.
A stop-and-go penalty for passing illegally during a caution period dropped Mansell from fourth to 13th place, but drove like a man on a mission and regained third place, still a lap behind, on lap 87.
Moments later, a strange series of events happened almost simultaneously.
Rookie Hideshi Matsuda, who had been running in the top 10 most of the day, spun into the turn 1 wall. As safety crewmen got to his car and quickly worked to remove the Japanese driver, John Paul Jr. spun and hit the wall in turn 3.
At nearly the same moment, Tracy coasted to the pits with smoke pouring from the rear of the car. His day was over.
Right behind him on the warmup lane that leads to the pits, Vitolo slid through oil and crashed into Mansell as both headed for the pits. Vitolo's car wound up atop Mansell's, the bottom of Vitolo's car apparently spewing the invisible flame of a methanol fuel fire.
Mansell leaped from his car, reaching toward his back. A safety patrolman tried to help him from the car and both wound up rolling on the ground.
Mansell, who refused to stay in the infield hospital for a complete examination, angrily said, "I've got a bit of a concussion."
Keywords:
AUTO RACING
by CNB