Happy Birthday Lil' Al
 

Happy 60th birthday to Al Unser Jr.

May you have many, many more!

Re: Happy Birthday Lil' Al
 

If you ever doubt why he drew the nickname Little Al, go to the family museum in Albuquerque. It's not JUST to differentiate him from Al Sr. They have the Pennzoil Nance that he drove and the seat in that thing is smaller than most children's car seats. I know that today you can get tiny full containment seats for kids racing micros and Jr sprints, but back in the day, a seat like this didn't exist.

The story was, they flew him into Lawton, OK to run that car in a CRA show. The Lawton regional airport is across the street from the race track, so Lanny drove the golf cart over to pick him up from the private plane. He raced. Seems like his night ended early, so Lanny drove him back over to the airport in his golf cart so Al could fly out to a Super Vee deal, or something. He would have been 16 or 17.

Great competitor. True to his roots. Hate they way things ended for him the way they did in his Indy career. I hope everyday he battles his demons and wins.

Re: Happy Birthday Lil' Al
 

I'm glad he found some redemtion, after his CART days were over, in the IRL (thanks to Tony George and those that supported his efforts over there). Too bad Roger didn't let him run the 500 during the early IRL days (when a CART race wasn't scheduled, I understand) and never let him run more NASCAR races either...but he did help him get a 2nd 500 win and championship.

Re: Happy Birthday Lil' Al
 

One of the most exciting races I've ever witnessed involved Al Jr. It was at Chicagoland. The race went green after the final yellow for about the last 30 laps or so. Sam Hornish and Al Jr. ran side by side at 220 MPH from the time it went green until the checkered flew. Hornish just barely nipped Al Jr. at the line. I was a seasoned bleacher jockey by that time but I'd never seen anything like that before on any track. I had taken the son of a good friend to that race and after about 20 laps of the epic show they were putting on I yelled in the kids' ear to make a special mental note of what he was witnessing because he may never see anything like this again. I'm pretty sure that holds true to this day for the kid. I know it does for me.

Re: Happy Birthday Lil' Al
 

The good ole days of Tony George's IRL! He had the vision, but not enough corporate support to get behind the teams and drivers...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2002_Delphi_Indy_300

Lazier, and the rest, were pretty close too...

To bad it didn't work for them to keep running there and have races like that...

Re: Happy Birthday Lil' Al
 

Racing aside, he's had some off-track issues related to alcohol abuse. I am glad to see the man is now standing tall and I hope he keeps his head in the game with respect to that. It is a tough fight, but he's a tough guy.

:6: Little Al!

Re: Happy Birthday Lil' Al