Richie's Hidden Gems Vol. 1
Richie's Hidden Gems Vol. 1
Richie Murray's list of USAC hidden video gems that may surprise and amaze you!
Webster’s Dictionary defines a gem as a precious or semiprecious stone, especially when cut and polished or engraved. These gems from the USAC archives have aged like a fine wine, but we’ve cut ‘em, polished ‘em and put them in a list for you to enjoy here as we look back on some of the rarest, least seen artifacts that you might be seeing here for the first time.
1980 Jerry Clum’s Racing Review
Give USAC racer, promoter, tire peddler, racing apparel seller and resident comedian Duke Cook a microphone and you know you’re in for a little bit of razzing and a few slightly off-color jokes. That about tells the story when Cook was the lead voice in the pits for Jerry Clum’s Racing Review at Eldora Speedway prior to a late 1970s event.
1980s Lincoln Park Speedway Ad
Send racing announcer/sometimes sprint car driver Gary Lee and a swashbuckling, overall-wearing Sam Hucklebucker into the studio and watch TV magic happen. Or something like that. This local Indiana TV commercial promoting Lincoln Park Speedway is sure to catch your eye, and possibly bring a tear to it as well.
1982 Lonnie Caruthers Victory Handstand
After winning a 500-lap midget race at the physically-demanding Indianapolis Speedrome, most drivers would feel like taking a break from any kind of exertion for a least a few minutes, maybe grab a water or an adult beverage and a lawn chair to take a break. Not Lonnie Caruthers, who decided to show off for the fans with not a cage stand – a handstand.
1986 USAC National Car Rental Ad
USAC has been a part of all facets of the automobile industry on and off the track. Back in 1986, we were conduction a nationwide study on rental cars and inspecting everything from brakes to ashtrays on automobiles and, ultimately determined that National Car Rental had the best conditioned automobiles in the car rental industry. No word on if the USAC Test Center is connected to the basement at USAC headquarters in Speedway, Indiana.
1986 Pepe Marchese Slips & Slides at the Rosemont Horizon
On indoor concrete track surfaces, it’s difficult to find grip. Tip-toeing around the bottom can get tedious and tiresome. Pepi Marchese decided to take matters into his own hand, burning rubber on the coke-syrup-doused surface and dirt tracking it around the Rosemont Horizon in Chicago to the delight (and laugher) of the crowd.
1988 Knoxville USAC Sprint Cars – with Wings!
USAC is synonymous for sporting no wings. But there was a time when that wasn’t always the case. Between 1987 and 1991, dirt track promoters had the option to decide whether the cars would run with the wing or sans wing when holding a USAC Sprint Car event at their track. That created some odd pairings like this 1988 USAC Sprint Car race at Knoxville Raceway, famous for both wings and Casey’s Pizza, and of course the Knoxville Nationals, now the premier wing sprint car race in the world.
1994 Page Jones / Gary Lee “Fight”
In 1994, an infamous incident occurred on national TV when sports talk show host Jim Rome and NFL Quarterback Jim Everett got into a childish skirmish that involved overturned tables and hurt feelings. USAC had their own version with ESPN racing announcer Gary Lee and USAC racing star Page Jones using slightly different commentary and having a little more lighthearted fun than Jim (Rome) and Chris err…Jim (Everett) had.
2001 Nashville Silver Crown Test
For the 2001 season, the newly built 1.333-mile, high-banked Nashville Superspeedway debuted and one of the highlights on the calendar was scheduled to be the USAC Silver Crown series. Prior to the race, a test was conducted in which produced a then-record speed average of 153.6 mph. As fast as that was, additional grinding was made to the track that increased the speeds even more for a follow-up test. This is video of that test from the view of Jerry Coons Jr. where the fastest average laps ever recorded in a standard Silver Crown car took place in a race that never happened.
1990 Rich Vogler’s Last Interview
On the morning of July 21, 1990, Rich Vogler’s last ever TV interview was shown on the Johnny Parsons Show on local Indiana station, WHMB. Later that day, Vogler, USAC’s winningest driver, lost his life in a USAC Sprint Car crash at Salem (Ind.) Speedway. While the interview was conducted earlier in the week and aired tape-delayed that Saturday morning, the footage offers one final look at the thoughts and what the future may have held for one of USAC’s greatest competitors.
