Bobby Unser - Al Unser, Sr - IROC Champions - Indianapolis 500 Winners - Daytona International Speedway - 1977

Bobby Unser had won the IROC Championship in 1975. Al won it in the year after this photo, in 1978. The Unser name is synonymous with success in the Indianapolis 500. Bobby, and Al Sr have won the race a combined seven times with Al winning four and Bobby three. Then throw in Al Jr, a two-time Indianapolis 500 winner. Bobby and Al Sr would both die in 2021 in New Mexico. Bobby at 87 of natural causes on May 2, and Al Sr after a long battle with cancer December 9, at the age of 82. Ripe ages for men who raced and won for many years in some of motor racing's most dangerous cars and venues through an era that saw many lives lost on the race track.

Schkee - Tom Spalding - SCCA CanAm - Charlotte Motor Speedway - 1978

The Schkee DB-1 was called the most beautiful race car you have never heard of and was the brainchild of Doug Schultz and race car builder Bob McKee. It was designed to help revive the old Can-Am Series using Lola T332 open wheel cars with bodies on them. Lola would introduce the T333 for Can Am racing and dominate with it. The Schkee in 1977 had a fully enclosed roll cage and had beat F-1 cars to the “ground effects” era by a year. It won the Can-Am race at St. Jovite, Canada in June of 1977 with Tom Klausler driving. Here the car is at Charlotte Motor Speedway in the May 1978 Can-Am race with driver Tom Spalding, where it finished seventh. Photographically, I was panning with the car on the backstraight and it's like the red sign painted on the wall is being swept off by the car and the high air box.

Silver Stacks - CanAm - Shadow DN4 - Watkins Glen - 1974

The eight carburetor injector stacks look like little trumpets on the UOP Shadow Can-Am car driven by Jean-Pierre Jarier in the Shadow "Grudge Match" at Watkins Glen in 1974. It was run the Saturday of the Formula One weekend. Jackie Oliver and George Follmer had been feuding as Shadow teammates during the 1974 Can-Am Series championship. Oliver won it and Follmer claimed that he had been ordered to let Oliver win in most of the races. The UOP Shadow team decided to turn this into a PR opportunity. They brought three of their Can-Am cars to the 1974 Grand Prix weekend at Watkins Glen to stage a 15-lap race for the drivers to show who was fastest. Jarier was one of the Shadow team Formula One drivers at the time and was put in the third car numbered 102. Follmer drove like a man possessed and won by a large margin. Only Jarier's car had the silver stacks, on Follmer's # 1 car and Oliver's # 101 car the stacks were black.

Uppity - Willy T. Ribbs - SCCA Trans Am Series - Summit Point International Raceway -1983

Willy T. Ribbs at Summit Point International Raceway for the 1983 SCCA Budweiser Trans Am race. He won the pole in qualifying and turned the fastest race lap in the No. 28 DeAtley/Budweiser Camaro. He would crash on lap 34 to bring out the lone caution of the event.  Ribbs was the subject of a documentary film "Uppity: The Willy T. Ribbs Story" which details his career as the first African American racing driver to win a Trans Am race, test a Formula One car and compete in the Indy 500. He said that other racers and their mechanics referred to him as “uppity” when he was trying to break into racing in the United States in the 1970s, and he used the taunt as motivation. This photo appeared in the book AutoRacing/ USA - 1983/The Year in Review.

Willy T. Ribbs - SCCA Trans Am Series - Summit Point International Raceway - 1985

Willy T. Ribbs at the July 1985 SCCA Trans Am race at Summit Point International Raceway in his Mercury Capri. Ribbs would win the race by 15.54 seconds over teammate Wally Dallenbach, Jr giving the Roush Protofab team a 1-2 finish. The Roush Protofab duo would win 12 of the 15 races that year. Ribbs led the way with seven triumphs but finished second in the standings, 16 points behind five-race winner Dallenbach.

Jean-Pierre Jarier - SCCA CanAm - Shadow DN6C Dodge - Charlotte Motor Speedway- 1978

Formula One driver Jean-Pierre Jarier takes his Shadow DN6C Dodge into the chicane on the backstretch at the May 1978 SCCA Can-Am race at Charlotte Motor Speedway. Jarier was competing in a race won by Elliot Forbes-Robinson in a nineteen-car field that also included 1980 Formula One World Champion Alan Jones, Al Holbert, Vern Schuppan, and Warwick Brown. Jarier would end that year in another black race car, the Lotus 79 John Player Special, for the final two Formula One races at Watkins Glen and Montreal. When Ronnie Peterson lost his life at Monza in September driving for Lotus Colin Chapman needed to fill Peterson's seat with a teammate for Mario Andretti. Andretti had clinched the 1978 World Driver's Championship after the Monza race. For those two races left on the schedule Chapman selected Jarier for the car. Jarier didn't disappoint, putting the car on the pole for that year's final Formula One race in Canada.

Schkee - SCCA CanAm - Charlotte Motor Speedway - 1978

A mechanic works on the Schkee Can-Am car in the pit area at Charlotte Motor Speedway for the race held there in May 1978. Tom Spalding drove the car finishing seventh. Basically, you are looking at a Lola T332 open wheel car with a body on it. The car had a fully enclosed roll cage, and used vacuum formed side windows that were actually NACA ducts acting as ram air for the engine.

Al Holbert - SCCA CanAm - Charlotte Motor Speedway - 1978

Al Holbert in his Lola Cam-Am car at Charlotte Motor Speedway in 1978. Holbert would finish fourth in the race. He would win the next to last Can-Am race that year at Laguna Seca. Holbert had a sterling record in racing, he was a five-time champion of the IMSA Camel GT series. He finished fourth in the 1984 Indianapolis 500. He won the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 1983, 1986, and 1987, the 24 Hours of Daytona in 1986 and 1987 and the 12 Hours of Sebring in 1976 and 1981. On September 30, 1988, Holbert was fatally injured when his privately owned propeller aircraft crashed shortly after takeoff near Columbus, Ohio. He was 41 years old.

Derek Bell - IROC - Daytona International Speedway - 1987

Derek Bell's IROC Camero Z28 sends out a burst of flames when his engine lets go at Daytona International Speedway in 1987. He was on lap 30 in the 40-lap race won by Geoffrey Bodine in round one of the four race IROC schedule.

Derek Bell - IROC - Daytona International Speedway - 1985

Derek Bell at the 1985 IROC race at Daytona, a venue where he had much success over the years. He won the 24 Hours of Daytona three times, in 1986, 1987 and 1989. Bell also won the Le Mans 24 hours race five times, in 1975, 1981, 1982, 1986 and 1987, making him the most successful British driver in that race to date.

Bobby Unser Helmet - IROC - Daytona International Speedway - 1977

A row of IROC Cameros on the starting grid at Daytona International Speedway in 1977 punctuated by the district helmet of Bobby Unser.

A J Foyt - IROC - Nazareth Speedway - 1989

A. J. Foyt was not happy at the IROC race at Nazareth Speedway in 1989. Maybe it was just the pink car he was assigned to drive, but with A J it could have been any number of things. He finished 5th and led 40 of the races 75 laps on the one-mile track.

A J Foyt - IROC - Nazareth Speedway - 1989

Maybe A. J. Foyt thought he was on one of the old dirt tracks that had occupied this property in Nazareth, Pennsylvania going all the way back to 1910. But in1989 he was competing in an IROC race on a track opened as Pennsylvania International Raceway by Roger Penske in the fall of 1987. Foyt, taking his IROC Chevrolet through the dirt at the edges of the paved track finished 5th in the 75-lap race, leading 40 of them. He was said not to be happy being assigned the pink Chevrolet IROC-Z, maybe he took that anger out on the car and track. Danny Sullivan won the race that day and Terry Labonte would become the 1989 IROC champion.

Bobby Unser - CART - Norton Spirit Penske - Watkins Glen - 1979

Bobby Unser won the 62 lap 1979 Kent Oil 150 CART race at Watkins Glen in the Norton Spirit Penske / Cosworth.

Al Unser Sr - CART - Chaparral 2K - Watkins Glen - 1979

Al Unser Sr driving the Jim Hall Chaparral 2K 'ground effect' car dubbed the Yellow Submarine at Watkins Glen in the 1979 Kent Oil 150. Al started the race from the pole and led 26 of the races 62 laps. The only other race leader was Al's brother Bobby Unser who won the race. Liveried in the simple but effective Pennzoil colors, the Chaparral 2K 'Yellow Submarine' was Indy racing's first proper ground effect car.

Paul Newman - SCCA TransAm Series - Summit Point Raceway - 1985

He was listed as P L Newman in the race programs. He went racing to get away from the Hollywood type fame and he loved it. He was a very good race car driver, winning and running competitively in a variety of racing divisions that included a 2nd place finish in the 1979 24 Hours of Le Mans. He didn't like to be photographed at the race track. That was a challenge for me as a racing photographer. I needed at least one good Paul Newman race car driver photo for my portfolio. He would have his race car brought over to his motorhome in the paddock so he could step out the door and into it, in an effort to avoid the inevitable group of assembled photographers. After seeing the scrum gathered there I went over to pit road, where the car would have to end up. I was the only one standing there when he pulled in. As I leaned in to get my shot I got one comment, "You Son of a Bitch!"

Helio Castroneves - Spider Man - Dancing with The Stars Winner - IndyCar Series - Richmond International Raceway - 2007

This 2007 photo of four-time Indianapolis 500 winner Helio Castroneves is at Richmond International Raceway, and in the same year he won "Dancing with the Stars" partnered with Julianne Hough. He is also known as "Spider-Man" due to his stopping his car and climbing the catchfence in front of the fans after winning a race. He began the tradition with his first CART victory in Detroit in 2000 and has repeated it each time since.

Team Penske - IndyCar Series - Richmond Raceway - 2007

The well-oiled machine that is Team Penske at the 2007 IndyCar Race at Richmond International Raceway service the car of Helio Castroneves. Every single crewman seems focused on a single individual task as they prepare the Dallara Honda for the race. The car would qualify sixth and finish eleventh in the Suntrust Indy Challenge. Dario Franchitti would lead 242 of the races 250 laps to win.

Sam Hornish Jr. - Team Penske - IndyCar Series - Richmond International Raceway - 2007

Sam Hornish Jr sits in his Team Penske Dallara Honda at the 2007 Richmond International Speedway IndyCar race. The year before he had won both the IndyCar Series Championship and the Indianapolis 500 driving for Penske. He had also won IndyCar Series championships in 2001 and 2002. He had won his last IndyCar Series race two races before Richmond, at brutally fast Texas Motor Speedway. At the conclusion of the 2007 season, Hornish Jr made the difficult decision to walk away from his very productive IndyCar Series career to run for Team Penske in NASCAR. That change is always difficult even for the best, and Hornish Jr had mixed results over the ten years in NASCAR. In the Cup Series he had 167 starts with no wins and three top five finishes. He fared better in the junior Xfinity Series where in 120 starts he had five wins, thirty-eight top five and sixty-four top ten finishes.

Marco Andretti - IndyCar Series - Andretti Green Racing - Richmond International Raceway - 2007

A pensive 20-year-old Marco Andretti early in the weekend at the Richmond IndyCar race in 2007. While the name and bloodline can get a driver to certain levels in the sport, it also carries enormous pressure that can be overwhelming in the quest to live up to that name. Marco is the third generation of the famous Andretti racing family. His father is IndyCar driving champion and team owner Michael Andretti. Marco's paternal grandfather is Mario Andretti, one of the most successful Americans in the history of motorsports. During his career, Mario Andretti won the 1978 Formula One World Championship and four IndyCar titles. He remains the only driver ever to win the Indianapolis 500 (1969), Daytona 500 (1967) and the Formula One World Championship. Marco has made 248 IndyCar Series starts over 15 seasons earning two victories, at Sonoma Raceway in 2006 and Iowa Speedway in 2011. He won the pole for the 2020 Indianapolis 500.

Scott Dixon and wife Emma- IndyCar Series - Richmond International Raceway - 2007

The Target Ganassi team cars started beside each other for the 2007 IndyCar race at Richmond International Speedway. Scott Dixon here standing with his wife Emma started third and Dan Weldon qualified fourth. Dario Franchitti would win the race by just .419 of a second over Dixon and Weldon would finish third.

Dan Weldon - IndyCar Series - Richmond International Raceway - 2008

Dan Weldon at the 2008 IndyCar race at Richmond International Raceway where he started sixth and finished fourth driving for Chip Ganassi. He was a previous Richmond IndyCar winner in the 2004 race when he won after starting the race from the twentieth position on the grid. Weldon was known for his radiant smile. The British driver won the 2005 IndyCar Series Drivers' Championship for Andretti Green Racing. He won the Indianapolis 500 in 2005 and 2011 and was co-winner of the 2006 24 Hours of Daytona. At the 2011 season-ending IndyCar race at Las Vegas Motor Speedway Wheldon was killed when during a fifteen car wreck his airborne car began rolling in mid-air and hit the catch-fence cockpit-first on the race's eleventh lap. He was 33 years old.

Danica Patrick - IndyCar Series - Richmond International Raceway - 2009

Danica Patrick brought fire to be relevant in a man's world.

Helio Castroneves - At Speed - Team Penske - IndyCar Series - Richmond International Raceway - 2009

Helio Castroneves at speed during practice at the 2009 and final IndyCar race at the .75-mile Richmond International Raceway. Castroneves qualified third for this race and with the pole going at 167.315 mph that day he has to be close to that here. In this race he would crash late in the race and finish seventeenth. He did get a win at Richmond in 2005 beating Dario Franchitti by .056 of a second. The Brazilian four-time Indianapolis 500 winner and “Dancing with the Stars” champion is fluent in Portuguese, English and Spanish.