INDY CAR RACING MEDIA CONFERENCE

October 23, 2001

Townsend Bell

Parnelli Jones

TOWNSEND BELL: Thank you.

PARNELLI JONES: Thank you.

PARNELLI JONES: I don't remember. I was out of town somewhere. I couldn't make the race. I wanted to come back and do that. I had planned on doing that and then got called away. This year, they got quite a few things for us to do out there. And of course, Toyota has been a big supporter of auto racing, so they've asked us to do that. And we have an autograph session on Saturday at 9:45 to 10:45, with all the legends. And there are quite a few of them.

PARNELLI JONES: Yes, we built the rest of my winning '63 Indy car, and we're kind of anxious to run it. We've never run it since it's been built. It's absolutely gorgeous. It's identical to my winning car, so we're working on getting all the fluids in it and everything else, and we'll probably take it out there and run it hopefully.

TOWNSEND BELL: The most important thing for me was to go out and win that race in Laguna Seca rather than to sit down and try to work out all the various possibilities on the points. I knew if I won the race, I would win the championship, and it was a race I very much wanted to win. I hadn't won there in four years since I started doing the Skip Barber School Series. So that meant a lot to me. Going into Fontana without the championship wrapped up would not have been ideal at all, because the Super Speedway Races and the Indy Lights car is really more of a drafting battle. Anything can happen there. It's a very exciting race and very close, but it's tough to have much control over the situation. So I was really relieved at some level and very pleased at the same time to win not only the race, but the championship a race early.

TOWNSEND BELL: Yes. From what I understand you can run two CART races before you lose your rookie status. And as the rules currently stand, CART allocates additional testing dates for rookies. Certainly it's my advantage if we can maintain that rookie status if we end up running CART next year.

PARNELLI JONES: Actually, I had won a lot of races before I went back east, out in California. I could have gone to Indianapolis a couple of years before I did, but I waited until I had an opportunity to get a real good ride and of course that came with J.C. Aganian, who fathered me a great deal because -- I don't know, he had a son about my age and lost him in a swimming pool and I always felt like he thought I was his son. Anyway, he was really instrumental with me and he prepared me with an opportunity to have good equipment and a good mechanic in Johnny Pohlson. Anyway, I also came back here with my Sprint car and obviously we had very good success with that. We won the Midwest Championship the first year and came back and won the National Championship two years in a row. At that point I was pretty well on my way.

PARNELLI JONES: Yes, Aggie did that very much so. First of all, Troy Ruttman had won Indianapolis earlier in 1952 for Aganian. And of course Aggie told me all the stories, because Troy Ruttman was my hero. He was one of the first guys I seen win a race. He was a young, big, burly guy that started in the back and won the race. And from that moment on he was kind of my hero, and the fact he had driven for Aggie. And Aggie tried to help him invest his money and he didn't want to do that and he partied a lot and spent all his money. I got to meet Troy later and he said, "Don't do what I did." He said get yourself a good accountant and good attorney and invest your money and stuff like that. And of course Aggie, as well, did the same thing, and Aggie helped me. We would go out and buy some real estate and make down payments on it. He always assured me if I couldn't make the payments, if I got hurt or something like that, he would certainly protect my investments. Also I had my other partner, Vel Melitich, who I later started a tire business with and started driving for him earlier in the stock cars, and he was also very instrumental in helping me financially, especially later, and I became his partner. And of course we had a lot of successes with our race team as well.

PARNELLI JONES: Actually, Paige really made me proud of him as a race driver. He won a lot of races. The year before he got hurt, in '93, I think he won 18 out of 42 races. He was actually leading the race when he got hurt. He got upside down with his car and the guy running second run into the top of him and gave him a head injury and we didn't know he was going to live the first three or four days. Anyway, he's come back a long ways. He just recently got married in April of this year, and he's doing quite well. He actually works a little bit for his father-in-law. He still does some therapy and also does a little work around our shop.

TOWNSEND BELL: I would say Eric Consenus (phonetic) is certainly near or at the top of that list. I was just thinking about that, listening to Mr. Jones talk. And I would have to say that a few of the things that I saw Greg Moore do on the race track were pretty inspirational and so a couple of those guys would jump out at me.

TOWNSEND BELL: Well, I certainly hope to be racing in the CART series next year. Those sort of announcements and decisions aren't really something that I influence or decide, so your guess is as good as mine. I sort of wait to do what I'm told, and hopefully we'll be able to make some announcements to my plans next year in a short time. I would think maybe some time after Fontana, but we'll just have to wait and see. I really don't know.

TOWNSEND BELL: I think it would be outstanding. Road Atlanta definitely is one of my favorite racing tracks. There's some very fast corners. Turn one in Road Atlanta is the fastest road course corner I believe on the Indy Lights schedule. I know it is on the Indy Lights schedule. It's different than the kink at Road America, which in miles an area is faster, but there's a lot more going on at turn one at Road Atlanta. And I think it would be a perfect venue. The sports cars are running there, the Audis and top prototype cars are probably somewhere in between on pace of the Indy Lights car and the Champ car. I think it would be a great track. My concern is it was a bit dirty off line there because you can drop tires in the dirt in some places. With a little bit of work on curving and the grass and those sorts of things, I think it would be an outstanding venue.

TOWNSEND BELL: Yes. The straightaway there is pretty long and there is a very slow corner leading on to the long straightaway, so most of the grip in that slow corner is going to come mechanically, so you can get very close to the car in front of you coming off that corner and there is quite a good tow heading down to the next left-hander, which there is a large braking area from very high speeds. So that combination always makes for good passing.

PARNELLI JONES: Actually, I don't know that one series could satisfy all the race circuits around. Here you have CART going overseas and Canada. They have eight races out of this country right now. And again, and a few road circuits in this country, as well. And then IRL, being basically for the ovals, it really takes two series to do that. However, you know, we started out with a big fight and that didn't set the tone very well. And the thing about open-wheel racing in this country, we have to be entertaining to compete against racing like NASCAR. And I think open-wheel racing is suffering a great deal because of the fact NASCAR is so entertaining. And Indy car racing, I know some of the best races I've seen is Indy Lights cars at Fontana, for example, where they're changing positions. And of course, the CART race was obviously great at Michigan this year. And then the same with the IRL race at another track. And that's what I'm kind of getting at, the fact that we have to compete with entertainment. And I think we need to work with these series more. And again, I don't think there is one series that could handle all the opportunities for all the race tracks.

PARNELLI JONES: We're like a big family racing, anyway. We're like brothers and everything else. We fight amongst ourselves sometimes, but obviously we have a lot of respect for each other and we certainly participate in a lot of things like this. I'm proud to be part of it. Thank you.

PARNELLI JONES: As far as the Trans Am thing, the vintage car thing, I probably will. It's a lot of fun, not too serious. As long as it fits with my schedule, I love doing it, getting a chance to go out and play with a lot of these guys. And I think the reason a lot of these vintage car races are so popular right now is because the guys can physically get in there and work on them and everything and they don't have all the computers on them and the debriefing after the race and that sort of thing. It's more like it used to be, so to speak.

PARNELLI JONES: Any time I get in a car, you know, I guess I take it pretty seriously. I'm very competitive and that's probably what compelled me a great deal in my racing career. I can't stand to lose, although I do get beat occasionally.

PARNELLI JONES: We had a good time.

PARNELLI JONES: He wants to whip on me, huh? (Laughs.)

PARNELLI JONES: Actually, first of all, I endorse a product call Roll-Guard. It's a new product that goes on the rear springs of a lot of cars and it keeps the stability of them a lot better so that they don't get upside down and then also I endorse a tire, which is a recreational tire. It's an off-road tire. It's a tire that's got my initials in it. And believe it or not, it's very quiet and gives tremendous transaction. So everybody is really high on the tire. But anyway, outside of that, I've accumulated some commercial real estate over the years. I sold my tire stores. I had 45 tire stores and I sold them a few years ago and accumulated some commercial real estate. I'm trying to say I'm semi-retired, but it seems like I'm busy all the time. I'm trying to get my handicap down, so I am playing a little golf.

PARNELLI JONES: I think the real thing that really helped me a great deal was, first of all, having a good car and a good team, too, but was the fact that I went there the year before with Jim Hertobise (phonetic) and he qualified the fastest qualifier on the second weekend. And later I watched the film and watched what he did and I kind of picked up on it. So later, when I got a chance to do some -- after my rookie year, I got a chance to do some tire testing, and I started working on what I had seen with him, and that helped me a great deal. And that was the fact I could run my car a little bit looser and not so tight that I was able to come off the corners a little bit harder, and I think that helped me a great deal. I don't know. I like the race track. It had four different turns. Even though they were similar, they were different, and the track fit me well.