IndyCar: Remembering AJ Foyt’s greatest moment

Of all the great drives in his 45 years, it has to rank as one of the most jaw-dropping performances. No, he didn’t win, but what A.J. Foyt did on Aug. 22, 1965 at Milwaukee’s State Fair Park might have been even more impressive than some of his record 67 victories in an Indy car.

Super Tex more than lived to his nickname that day by capturing the pole position in a front-engine, upright dirt car. Not a roadster, mind you, but the same Wally Meskowski car he’d driven to victory the day before on the one-mile dirt track at Springfield, Ill.

“Pretty damn impressive as I recall,” said Dan Gurney, who qualified on the outside of the front row that day in the AAR Lotus 38, with Mario Andretti Brabham-Hawk third fastest in his Brabham-Hawk and Gordon Johncock fifth quick in his Gerhardt-Offy.

Twenty-one of the 26 starters were in rear-engined machines and Foyt would have been also but his Lotus didn’t make the trip after blowing up in Indy so he showed up at The Milwaukee Mile with no car.

“I washed off the dirt car and was already mounting pavement tires when A.J. came up and asked what I was doing,” recalled Stev

e Stapp, the longtime open wheel mechanic who was also a pretty fair sprint-car shoe in the early 1960s. “I told him I was getting his car ready for practice and he said he wasn’t going to drive that against all those rear-engined cars. Then he said, ‘You think we can do it?’ And I told him he could so he went and put on his uniform.”

Indy’s first four-time winner chuckles at the memory. “I wasn’t planning to drive and Steve convinced me we should give it a shot.”

In the first practice period, Stapp clocked A.J. and was giddy with what he saw.

“Foyt came in and asked how he was running and I said you’re almost a second quicker than anybody,” continued Stapp. “He cussed at me and said I didn’t even know how to read a damn stopwatch. “So I handed it to him before he went out for more practice and said, ‘You do everything else perfect, go time yourself.”’

In qualifying, A.J. ran a lap of 33.37 seconds (107.881 mph) while hiking the left-front tire and that was a tick faster than Gurney’s best of 33.58. The roar of the packed grandstands on Foyt’s cool-off lap is still one of the loudest on record.
Already a four-time USAC national champion, Foyt led the first three circuits before Gurney took over the next 26 laps and then Andretti owned the top spot from Laps 30-127 before breaking down.

The future teammates for a Le Mans triumph (1967) traded the lead before Gurney’s engine expired and then A.J. had to pit. “I used up the right-rear tire so I needed a

new one and it was kind of a long stop because we also had to use dump cans to put in the fuel.”

Explains Stapp: “We had those 15-inch wheels and they stuck way out so it was a bitch to get a wheel hammer in there and knock off the wing nut. It was hotter than hell and I burned my hand but A.J. was screaming at me to hurry up.”

When the checkered flag fell, Johncock had earned his initial IndyCar win and Foyt had earned 200 laps of universal respect – and second place.

“I’d have to say that was one of my career highlights,” said the legend who raced roadsters to ground effects cars and beyond in his record 35 starts at Indianapolis.

But Stapp remembers the ride back to Indy towing the dirt car. “A.J. was pissed off because he hadn’t won so he didn’t talk all the way home. He wasn’t mad at me or anything, he was just mad he hadn’t won.

“And that kind of desire is what made him so great.”