Motor Racing : Al Unser Gets a Ride; 2 Other Former Winners Also Must Still Qualify

An unusually high number of 15 starting positions remain to be filled this weekend for the May 24 Indianapolis 500, but the caliber of drivers not yet qualified is even more unusual.

Three former winners, Al Unser, Gordon Johncock and Tom Sneva, are not yet in the race, although Unser and Johncock are late replacements for injured drivers and did not get on the track last week at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

Unser, 47, was named to replace Danny Ongais in one of Roger Penske’s three cars after doctors refused to give Ongais a medical clearance following treatment for a concussion he received in a crash last Thursday. Unser, a three-time winner of the 500 who has driven in 21 of the last 22 500s, will drive an ’86 March-Cosworth rather than the Penske-Ilmor Chevy that Ongais was scheduled to drive.

Unser managed to get in eight laps Wednesday and reached a speed of 197.585 m.p.h. The 500 will be his first race this year.

Johncock, a two-time winner who has not raced an Indy car since retiring two years ago, replaced the injured Jim Crawford in Pat Patrick’s American Racing Series Buick and did not get on the track until last Monday. After moving cautiously up to speed, the 50-year-old hit 200.405 Wednesday.

Sneva crashed two of Mike Curb’s Skoal Bandit Marchs last week, and the crew is attempting to patch together one car strong enough to make it through four qualifying laps Saturday.

Sneva is considered one of Indy car racing’s premier oval track qualifiers, having won the 500 pole three times with record runs, so his absence focuses attention on the strange circumstances surrounding this year’s time trials.

Kevin Cogan, runner-up to Bobby Rahal in last year’s 500, and Al Unser Jr., winner of 1986’s final race in Miami, are also not yet in. Cogan reached 210.102 m.p.h. in practice last week, but after his March brushed the wall the following day, the Palos Verdes driver was unable to approach racing speeds again. Cogan did not make a qualifying attempt last weekend.

Young Unser, on the other hand, made one attempt but when his first lap was only 201, he called it off. His team, Doug Shierson Racing, apparently made the wrong switch between seasons. When national champion Rahal changed from his winning March to a Lola, Shierson went the other way, going from Lola to March.

There have been 14 crashes since the Speedway opened May 2 and 10 of them involved new-model Marchs.

“It’s no fun being on the outside looking in,” Unser Jr. said. “I can tell you right now what our problem is, and that’s tires. We’re just not used to the radials. The March is a very good car and the Goodyear radial is a very good tire, but the combination of the March, the radial and the amount of rubber on the track made me too slow to qualify.”

Apparently the ’86 March chassis does not have the same problem adapting to radial tires as the ’87 and by race day the entire Penske team of Rick Mears, Danny Sullivan and Unser may be in the older models. Mears abandoned his ’87 Penske PC-16 last week and qualified an older March on the front row. Sullivan, whose March was back at Penske headquarters in Reading, Pa. and not available last weekend, qualified his Penske-Ilmor Chevy at a relatively slow 205.288. However, the 1985 winner is expected to have his March at the track today and may withdraw his qualified car and try anew with the older car.

Other Indy car regulars under the gun this weekend include Josele Garza, Johnny Parsons, Dennis Firestone, Tony Bettenhausen, Ed Pimm, Derek Daly, rookie Fabrizio Barbazza and A. J. Foyt’s entourage of veteran George Snider and rookies Davy Jones and Stan Fox.

MIDGETS--Billy Vukovich III, firmly entrenched as leader of the United States Auto Club’s supermodifed series, will take time off Sunday night to drive in the USAC Western States midget race at Ascot Park. Vukovich will be facing Sleepy Tripp, who has won 4 of 7 races since returning from a successful tour of Australia and New Zealand. Also on the program will be a three-quarter midget race featuring Rick Gray, Dennis Hart and Denise Bennet. . . . The TQs will also race Friday night at Ventura.

SPRINT CARS--California Racing Assn. cars and drivers will be back at Ascot Park on Saturday night to resume the Parnelli Jones Firestone series after six races in Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas. Lealand McSpadden, who makes Baylands Raceway in Northern California his home track, won four of the six races, but the other two winners, Mike Sweeney and John Redican, will be at Ascot.

DRAG RACING--The National Hot Rod Assn.’s Winston Pacific Division series, featuring more than 400 sportsman car drivers, will debut this weekend at the L. A. County Raceway in Palmdale. Two-time world alcohol funny car champion Brad Anderson of Covina will be favored in his class, while Jay Payne of Temple City will lead the alcohol dragster field. Anderson recently set a career-best elapsed time of 6.201 seconds in winning the Winston All-Stars meet in Ennis, Tex. Champions will be crowned in all eight sportsman classes in Sunday’s eliminations.

OFF-ROAD RACING--Steve Sourapas, a La Jolla beer distributor, won the 20th annual Mint 400 in his Raceco single-seater buggy in 8 hours 50 minutes. Rod Hall, in a four-wheel-drive Dodge pickup, and Manny Esquerra, in a Ford Ranger, won their ninth straight class championships, but Walker Evans lost his bid for a ninth win when Stan Gilbert won Class 7 in a two-wheel drive Ford pickup. Defending overall series champions Jack Ramsey and Spencer Low were both winners. Of 338 starters, 110 finished.

SPORTS CARS--Chris Cord, coming off successive wins in the Times Grand Prix at Riverside and Laguna Seca GTO/GTU races, will be trying for three in a row in Dan Gurney’s Toyota Celica when the IMSA Camel GT series runs at Firebird Raceway in Chandler, Ariz., this weekend. Cord, a 47-year-old investment banker from Beverly Hills, had planned on running a limited schedule before his teammate, Dennis Aase, broke both legs in an accident testing a GTP car. Now Cord is not only Gurney’s No. 1 driver but also the series leader. The 300-kilometer race is Sunday on 1.5 mile track.

SPEEDWAY BIKES--Sam Ermolenko of Corona and Ronnie Correy of Fullerton, members of the British League Wolverhampton team, will race tonight at Ascot Park’s South Bay Stadium and Friday night at the Orange County Fairgrounds in Costa Mesa against local favorites Bobby Schwartz, Mike Faria and Alan Christian. Schwartz has won all five main events this season at Ascot. . . . San Bernardino’s Inland Speedway will host the annual Bruce Penhall Classic next Wednesday night with the former two-time world champion on hand.

STOCK CARS--Saugus Speedway, in addition to its regular modified and sportsman main events Saturday night, will introduce automobile train racing. Each three-car “train” will consist of a leading car closely coupled to two driverless cars. After a three-week layoff, hobby, foreign stocks and jalopies will resume racing Friday night at Saugus. . . . Orange Show Speedway in San Bernardino will have a 100-lap enduro Saturday and a monster truck race Sunday. . . . Street stocks will be featured Saturday night at Bakersfield Speedway as pro mods take the night off.

DRAG BOATS--The Bill Todd Memorial championship race, sanctioned by the International Hot Boat Assn., will be held Sunday at Lake Castaic. Todd was killed in an accident last year at Castaic when his boat, Billy the Kid, went out of control at better than 200 m.p.h. and disintegrated. More than 200 boats are expected for qualifying Saturday and eliminations Sunday in eight classes.

RALLY--Former motorcycle racer Lon Peterson of Victorville won the Rim of the World Rally in a Plymouth Arrow. Peterson and navigator Jim Love won 7 of the first 8 stages in the 12-stage event to edge Bill Holmes, who drove a Ford pickup. Mike Biddlingmeier of Ridgecrest won the stock class in a Dodge Colt.

LAND SPEED--The SoCal Timing Assn. will open its 50th season Sunday with time trials at El Mirage dry lake.

MOTORCYCLES--Former world observed trials champion Bernie Schreiber of La Crescenta will compete May 23-24 in the Temecula Nationals, an American Trials Assn. championship event near the intersection of Highway I-15 and Clinton Keith Rd. in the Lake Elsinore area. . . . CMC motocrossers will ride Friday night at Ascot Park.