[Midget98]

They have that now. It's called USAC Silver Crown. I'd love to see some IndyCar drivers try to make the show at a mile dirt track.

[jdull99]

Originally Posted by Stevensville Mike Had to do a little digging, but I remember that Mario Andretti won his first Champ Car (IndyCar) race there. 1965. Also, that was the first time IndyCars raced on a road course. Al Unser won the last one in 1970. Is the track pavement even still there?

They mentioned Mario's win there on this wknd's NHRA Nationals coverage actly

[stp6237]

USAC's biggest mistake happened when they took the dirt tracks off the championship trail, more or less to appease the road racing crowd. Dan Gurney, Jim Hall, Pat Patrick, Rodger Penskie and other did have a legitimate beef with the BoD of USAC when non-championship owners and drivers were voting on rules and regulations that affected championship racing. Also USAC did a poor job when it came to marketing the series and that resulted in the famous Dan Gurney "White Paper" outlining what needed to be done to correct the perceived problems. With the USAC plane crash that wiped out most of the USAC officials and the death of Tony Hulman, the door was open for the CART revolt. There is a lot of discussion on the Indy Car forum about lack of support, other that Andretti Motor Sport and Schmidt Peterson for the feeder system for Indy Car by major owners, (read that as Penskie and Chip G.) Back in the day when many owners had midget, sprint, dirt champ cars AND Indy Champ cars, there was your feeder system. My solution is for every street race on the tour, add a dirt track to the tour. I can live with natural road courses, just hate the street races. How many points would Ed Carpenter have now if this was the case. Imagine that the point chase could come down to the 4 Crown champ car race at Eldora. Do you think Larson and Bell might get a sniff from an Indy Car owner to run the whole series? How's that for a marketing idea! I saw ever 500 winner from 1950 to 1964 run a midget, sprint, or champ at Williams Grove, Reading, or Allentown prior to or after winning their 500. The only exception was Vucky, but I think he ran a midget back East before he won the 500 but I am not 100% sure. Look at how many great 500 champions have had success on the dirt tracks after 1966. Al and little Al Unser, Bobby Unser, Johnny Rutherford, Mario Andretti, Gordon Johncock won the first Williams Grove Open, and I saw all of them race on dirt. Rick Mears ran off road races on dirt tracks, even Will Power started on dirt with "speedcars". Sorry for the log post, I know we can never go back to what it was, but I loved what Mario said about losing Pocono, "It's not a track for sissies." By the way, I will be at Richmond for the Indy Car race!