Critical Mass - Blind Man's Bluff = SPLIT THREAD

[bluffman]

Re: Critical Mass - Blind Man's Bluff = SPLIT THREAD

I already had a USAC Chief Mechanics licence, and Darrell had got a licence somehow, I can’t remember what it took for a driver to run his first Indy car race, maybe just a waiver. Of course we had to go through an inspection process, but there were no problems with that. Finally Darrell was allowed to go out for a practice session, and since he had never drove one of these beasts, he was kind of sneaking up on it. There were other cars on the track, so he had to pick it up pretty quick or get run over. He ran a few laps, and then coming off turn two into the dog leg, he spun and went down into the infield. Lots of that desert dust was flying, but the car was not damaged, just had to clean out the cockpit, and the engine. Darrell got back out in another practice session, and everything seemed to be O.K. Next, he had to make a qualifying run, and he made the show. We had cleared the first hurdle! The race started, and Dockery was doing fine, and later in the race he was “black flagged”, and had to come into the pits. Gordon and I went over to see what the problem was and we were told that he was brought in for leaking oil. Me, Gordon and a couple of tech guys looked the car over, and it was bone dry. It was another red car that was oiling the track down, and we sent him back out. He finished the race, and we had cleared a second hurdle. Now we had to get organized and get the car ready for the road course at Sears Point Raceway in Sonoma, California.
Larry

[bluffman]

Re: Critical Mass - Blind Man's Bluff = SPLIT THREAD

We left Phoenix, and headed for Sears Point, but stopped by my home in Cypress, California for a few days so that I could change the set- up on the chassis from the oval track settings over to a road race set- up since now Darrell would be making right as well as left turns. I had been to Sonoma previously, and knew pretty well what settings should be, cambers, ride heights, and such. The gear ratios in the transaxle also had to be changed. This was all done in short order, and we began the long trek to Sonoma with high hopes of qualifying for the race, even though Dockery had never ran a road course. It was imperative that we make the show there in order to complete step two in the process to get to run at Indy.

Darrell adapted to the road course just fine, and the car handled good right off the trailer, just made a few shock absorber adjustments, and I seem to recall that the gear ratios were pretty close. We didn’t have a big selection of gears anyway, so any changes were out of the picture anyway. We were in the “run what you brung” mode. Darrell qualified pretty good, fast enough to make the show, and ran reasonably well all day. We had cleared yet another hurdle. We stopped at my home in Cypress again on our way back to Phoenix to see my family, and I guess that was so I could tell them that I would “ see them in the fall , if at all.“ That may sound a bit crude, but that’s the way it was in those days when I was going racing. Then we headed on to Phoenix to gather things up at Gordon Cole’s shop, and head east. The next, and final race we had to run was at Trenton, New Jersey, and since the entry fee for Indy had been made by Keith Hall, owner of the “Manzanita Speedway” in Phoenix we were allowed to go to the Indy Speedway and prepare for the Trenton race there. The trip from Phoenix to Indy was horrible, there was three of us in a Ford Ranchero that had bucket seats, and a center console. That meant that one of us had to “ride” that damned console which was real uncomfortable! We switched off now and then, but it was brutal. The pick- up bed was loaded with tools, parts, and of course our luggage, and we were pulling the trailer with the race car, which didn’t help the ride comfort any. To add to all of this, we didn’t have but about $175.00 between us. Looking back on it, we must have been completely nuts! We had a home made car, a rookie driver and no money, and we were going to Indianapolis to attempt to compete with the best of the best. We made it to Indianapolis without too much drama somehow. We checked in and they assigned us to garage #10 in “Gasoline Alley”, and that would be our “home” for the rest of the year. That’s how it was done there, along with your 500 entry you got the use of a garage all year. That’s it for tonight, my fingers are tired, but I am going to try adding a photo taken when we left my home in Cypress. Larry

[AAFO_WSagar]

Re: Critical Mass - Blind Man's Bluff = SPLIT THREAD

Larry,

I've been soo busy past few months doing *other* websites in order to be able to keep this one going... I gotta take a second and say, you're just some kind of blessing!

I watch the board, stress over not being able to add anything to the board or the site and then you come in and add a jewel from your life in racing!

Just makes it all worth while being able to be a part of this!

Thank you a MILLION times over for sharing your racing life here Larry!

It's like the old serials in the theaters.. (many too young to remember).. watch "Rocket Man" get into trouble, then wait till next week to see what happens...

You're our Rocket Man Larry!!

We simply HAVE to get you to Reno in '08... !

Fans/AAFOvisitors.. Agree????????????

Let's hear it for Larry at Reno '08!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[wolfee]

Re: Critical Mass - Blind Man's Bluff = SPLIT THREAD

We simply HAVE to get you to Reno in '08... !

Fans/AAFOvisitors.. Agree????????????

Let's hear it for Larry at Reno '08!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

You have my vote!

I agee, this thread is one amazing read! I fid my self in awe over the many stories, and accompishments Larry has had over the years. It is truly inspiring to me.

Wolfee

[BillFrancis]

Re: Critical Mass - Blind Man's Bluff = SPLIT THREAD

Larry,

Thank you for sharing your racing adventures. The first thing I do every morning is checkin here to see if you've posted another page or two of the story, Great read. Thanks again.

Bill

[Skyracer]

Re: Critical Mass - Blind Man's Bluff = SPLIT THREAD

Let's hear it for Larry at Reno '08!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

LARRY - LARRY - LARRY - LARRY - LARRY

[wyhdah]

Re: Critical Mass - Blind Man's Bluff = SPLIT THREAD

I agree as well on the post and Reno 08. The picture of the car I'm sure doesn't do it justice but it looks like a nice race piece in spite of that. Very nice, I wish Indy still had that kind of sprit, you know build it and race it.

[bluffman]

Re: Critical Mass - Blind Man's Bluff = SPLIT THREAD

We were inside the Speedway fences, and had our garage#10 to work out of, now we had to find a place to “live”. Since we were a little short of bucks we would have to settle for something within our means, you know, cheap with a capitol “C”. There was this elderly couple, I think it was Fred and Gert that rented rooms, no make that “sleeping quarters” in the basement of their home. Fred was a barber, and had his shop in the house as well. They had the basement partitioned off into separate rooms, and the three of us shared one of these. My younger brother Joe also occupied one of them. Ol’ Gert kept the place clean, and kept our bedding, and clothes washed, and we had the option of having breakfast if we chose. One big problem was that there was this rather steep stairway that had to be negotiated to get to our room. This meant that Darrell and Gordon had to tote me up and down these stairs in my wheelchair every time we came or went. This was a real thrill if we were coming home after having a few beers! I must say that the worse thing about living in the basement was that in the shower that they had added there were these big black “water bugs” they called them. They were about the size of my thumb. When I would wheel in to shower these things would “crunch” loudly as I rolled over them. ( I don’t know how the other guys handled this, surely not with bare feet). Home is home, and not always perfect, you just put up with the distractions.

There had been a thing set up in Phoenix with a radio station or something called, “Dollars For Dockery”, I never knew much about it, but letters would come to the USAC mail room addressed to Darrell, and inside these envelopes were checks and cash. We never knew what would be found inside, maybe a dollar from some kid, or a check for a few hundred dollars. That’s what we survived on! There was a “White Castle” just across the street from the main gate into the Speedway, and they had what they called “hamburgers” for about 15 cents or so. Darrell and Gordon handled them pretty well, but my system wouldn’t tolerate them, so I ate their “fish” thing. Having spent five years in the Air Force, and had been to such places as Libya, and England where the Mess Sergeants sold off the good stuff to the Brits, and fed us what was left, I was accustomed to eating whatever was available, so this wasn’t a big deal. I remember once that a Mess Sergeant told us that they weren’t there to fatten us up, just there to keep us alive. One Christmas in England all they had for the “Troops” was boxes of hard Christmas candy and case after case of “triple sec”, some kind of wine or something. I kind of got off the subject there, but I couldn’t help but throw that in. That’s the thing about memories, little things slip in now and then. Every now and then we would go to a proper restaurant for a real meal, so it wasn’t really so bad. There was a guy, I think his name was Jug, who owned a chicken joint, and he would bring a bunch of chicken to the track and pass it around. There was a pizza place that would come around now and then also. It was not as bad as it might sound, I don’t recall ever going hungry. After the Trenton race we had a refrigerator in our garage, and there was always food in there, even Pete Conrad, the astronaught would come in and fix himself a sandwich now and then. I jumped ahead a little again, we still have to go to Trenton.

We did the three in the Ranchero again with one of us riding the console off and on. Trenton had been a one mile track, but some nut decided that it should be bigger, so coming off turn two and about half way down the straightaway they put in a right turn that led to what would be turn three normally making for a new turn three and four that had a much larger radius, and was banked fairly steep. Where they made that right turn there was a rather high concrete wall on the inside of the turn. Everybody was finding it difficult to find a line coming off turn two and around that right turn without being way out of line to enter the new turn three. Several drivers got into deep trouble trying to do this transition. Foyt, Andretti, Johncock, and some of the other “hot dogs” came up with a solution to the problem. This was come off turn two and stand on the gas, and head straight for that big concrete wall, and the car would drift out slightly and just barely miss the wall and put you on a good line into turn three. Some found this to be a little scary, but after trying it found it to be no problem. I don’t recall anyone hitting that wall using this approach. Darrell had no problems in practice, and qualified for the race. We were the only non- turbo charged car to make the show, we were still running the Chevy engine. Once the race got started, Darrell was running real good, picking up several positions. He and the car just loved that big sweeping turn three and four. He passed Lloyd Ruby, a real hot dog with a turbo- Offy on the outside there. Ruby passed him back down the front chute, but Darrell passed him again in three and four. Gordon and I wee in the pit watching all this action, and having a ball. Then, I don’t remember what lap it was on, as Darrell went zooming by, I heard something, and can’t explain what it was, but I told Gordon the engine was going to blow, and he looked at me like I was crazy, but just as Darrell came by on the next lap the engine exploded right in front of us, and Darrell went sliding in his own oil into the wall HARD! It tore the whole right rear corner off, suspension and all. The old girl was hurt bad, and it was going to be a real chore getting it repaired for the upcoming Rookie Test at Indianapolis. This will really test our mettle, now we would really see how tough and determined we were, and there would be a lot of people watching to see how we would handle it.
Larry

[bluffman]

Re: Critical Mass - Blind Man's Bluff = SPLIT THREAD

We had ten days after the Trenton crash to get the car ready to begin the Rookie Test with Dockery, and we had a lot of work to do, even more than we thought. Besides the right rear suspension, and the upright (hub carrier and casting for outer suspension arms), the brake discs, brake calipher, and drive axle, being junk, the monocoque tub had about an 8- 10 inch vertical split in it along side the cockpit. This was serious, the tub was the main structure of the car, in lieu of a frame, and also the fuel tank and body. The tub was supposedly made from 2024 aluminum, and was not considered readily weldable. Well, Gordon was a super welder, we always said that “he could weld bananas to glass”. (later in the month Andy Granatelli would borrow him to build some exhaust headers for his car, even though he had several “good” welders working for him.) Gordon got it welded up fine, but it took some time, and we didn’t know if it would be straight or banana shaped after. We strung some strings and took measurements, and it was straight. Had the tub been made from softer aluminum it probably have stretched before spitting. We “borrowed” an upright from Howard Milliken, along with a hub, drive axle, brake disc , and calipher. The rear bulkhead was also bent, and we had to pull the engine and transaxle out of the car. Gordon, Darrell, and I were all busting our butts. Gordon made new radius rods, and an upper control arm, but we had no jig to build a new lower control arm, and someone “loaned” us one. The list could go on and on, but to make this a bit more brief, the three of us worked five days and nights straight, close to 120 hours with no sleep, and very little time off to eat. We were beat, but the car was done, the engine fired up, the car was painted, and you would have never known it had been crashed. In fact several people swore that we had bought another car, not repaired the wreck! But the people that mattered knew what we had accomplished! We knew that we had ten days to get it done, but you never know what may turn up during a repair like this, so we chose to do it our way. Now we had five days left that we may not have had otherwise. We locked up the garage and took a day off to rest. A funny thing that I need to bring up is that when we began this repair someone had a radio on and we heard that Ray Stevens song, “Everything is Beautiful” playing, and that became our “theme song”, as we toiled away. Some people who would be walking by or stopping to look into the garage probably thought we were lunatics, because every now and then one or all of us would start singing that song. It became a tension breaker when the going got tough. It was somehow like getting a burst of adrenalin or something. Another bit of humor should be mentioned at this time, because I am in a humorous mood after writing the above caper. Darrell had to submit a resume previously, maybe it was before the Phoenix race, I don’t know, but here’s how it went. The usual date of birth, home town, education, and all that trivial stuff, then experience, races won, championships, etc. Now we were in trouble, Darrell hadn’t raced very long, and so we had to get creative. We had a few beers, and started laughing and scratching, and coming up with all kinds of B.S. A few more beers and we started writing down races won at non- existent tracks, and championships in series that never existed, and then there was a question about hobbies and talents. I don’t remember what was put in there about hobbies, if anything, but for talent Darrell put down that he played the fiddle and sang country and western music. I don’t know who if anybody checked any of this stuff out except Bob Laycock. He was I guess you could say involved in “special events”, because he came by the garage one day and explained that he had some kind of musical event scheduled and the fiddle player couldn’t make it, and wondered if Darrell could possibly fill in. Darrell had an ace in the hole, he had cut a tendon in I think it was his left ring finger many years previously, and it had a kink in it, it would not go straight out. Darrell explained to Mr. Laycock that he sure wish he could, but he had hurt his finger, and was unable to participate. Whew, dodged another bullet, and we started singing “Everything is Beautiful”. We were well rested and the car was about as good as we could get it without running a few practice laps to determine if we had a decent set- up for the Indy track. There is yet another incident worth mentioning at this stage, it should have been in the previous post about repairing the wreck. I had it in my notes laying here, and I overlooked it. I think it was during the second day of the five day fiasco that I developed a real bad toothache, and it hurt like hell. I sure wasn’t going to take off and go to a Dentist, too much work to get done. Well, there was this old timer Barney Navarro who if any of you are old enough to remember, built speed equipment, mainly Navarro aluminum heads for the flat head Fords, and intake manifolds also. He did a lot of Bonneville speed runs also. He had , believe it or not, entered a car in the 500 at this time, with a six cylinder turbo- charged Rambler motor in it. I had known him for some time and had noticed that he had a lot of dental tools in his tool box. I told Darrell and Gordon that I was going to go over to Barneys garage for a few minutes. I get over there and tell Barney about my toothache, and he said he would take a look at it. He said that he could fix that, and told me to roll over to the rear of his car, and put my feet up on the rear tire, and kind of lay back in my chair. He came over with a flashlight and a Q-tip, and looked in my mouth and dug around with the Q- tip. He went over to his tool box and came back with a little tray with some plier looking thing, a scalpel, some other ominous utencils, and a bottle of whiskey. He told me to take a swig of whiskey, swash it around, and spit it out. Then he told me to take another drink and swallow it. He had one of his friends hold the flashlight, and he started probing around, and said he would have to do a little cutting, and away he went, it was an upper jaw tooth, and he was doing a lot of pulling and twisting, and said he would need to do some more cutting, and I did my best to say O.K. Very quickly he gave a yank, and I saw that he had my tooth in the pliers. He had me wash my mouth out with another swig of whiskey, then told me that he would need to stitch it up. He went back to his tool box, and came back with a curved needle and some thread, and finished the proceedure. He put some unknown to me what it was, gauze, or maybe a piece of shop rag in my mouth and told me to bite down on it for a while to stop the bleeding, and said that he was done, and I went back to our garage and went back to work. “Everything is Beautiful”!

Larry

[MUSNTCHIT]

Re: Critical Mass - Blind Man's Bluff = SPLIT THREAD

the phraze "on a wing an a prayer" applies to many scenarios... perhaps not this one, but again...perhaps...? A hard, tough, true accounting of these brave, tough, passionate, daring and hungry guys, on a shoestring financially and more, tryin' to fulfil their dream of makin' the big time... The Indianapolis "500" starting field, one of the greatest achievements in American auto racing... I wasn't a part but I witnessed this up close...rb

[hm66sk]

Re: Critical Mass - Blind Man's Bluff = SPLIT THREAD

Larry,


We simply HAVE to get you to Reno in '08... !

Fans/AAFOvisitors.. Agree????????????

Let's hear it for Larry at Reno '08!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Most definitely!!!!
Your stories are amazing and it would be an honor and a privilege to meet you in person.

[bluffman]

Re: Critical Mass - Blind Man's Bluff = SPLIT THREAD

The Indy rookie test required the driver to complete four phases, each phase had to consist of ten laps at the prescribed speed plus or minus two miles per hour while being observed by spotters who were experienced Indy 500 drivers. These “spotters” would look for how the rookie entered the turns, and the exit off the turns, and also how smooth the rookie was. If he was too erratic he would be called in for a “consultation”. I think the phases that year were: 10 laps at 150 MPH
10 laps at 155 MPH
10 laps at 160 MPH
And 10 laps at a comfortable speed over 160, but still had to be within plus or minus two miles per hour.

Darrell went out for the first phase, and I think he got all 10 laps in a row, but the engine started going away on lap 8, but he completed that phase. We took the car back to our garage to diagnose the engine problem, and found that the head gaskets had blown. We were pretty much done for the day, and would replace the gaskets, and look everything over, and continue phase two the following day.

Darrell went out for phase two, and it looked good to Gordon and I, but after about three laps he was called in for “consultation”. The problem was that he was going too fast, well over the 155 MPH necessary for this phase. This “consultation” did not set too well with Dockery, he thought this process was ridiculous, he felt good at the speed he was running and as far as he was concerned it should not be a big deal. He was informed that this process had to do with discipline, or something to that effect. I was not there, so I can only go by what Gordon told me, which was that Darrell got into a heated argument with the USAC people, and punched one of them, knocking him down. I was in our garage, and I saw Darrell and Gordon coming, and I could tell that Dockery was fuming, mad as hell. I asked what happened and when told, I figured that we were done. It was “go home time”, there were a lot of good drivers sent home for a whole lot less than this!

Well, the “fickle finger of fate” was about to be challenged! Elmer George was about to enter the fray, Elmer had been a produce packer like Dockery was, and they were friends. Elmer was also a race driver, and while doing that he met Mary Hulman, the daughter of Tony Hulman who owned the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, and had married her. Shortly after we had arrived at Indy, Elmer had stopped by and he and Dockery had quite a visit, laughing about old times packing cantalope, etc. Some of the veteran mechanics asked me at that time what the connection was between these two guys. Nobody, but nobody messed with Elmer, except A.J. Foyt, as far as I know, because they were good friends. I don’t have a clue how it went down, but I can only surmise that Elmer had heard about Darrell’s predicament, and intervened, because a USAC official came to the garage and told Darrell that he could continue his rookie test, but would need to follow the rules regarding speeds. Needless to say, I was stunned by this, I had been at Indy before, and heard a lot of horror stories about drivers being sent packing but I had never heard of anything like this happening.

More later, Larry

[bluffman]

Re: Critical Mass - Blind Man's Bluff = SPLIT THREAD

Thanks be to Elmer, I’m sure, We went to the pit lane, and Darrell ran a few warm up laps, and came in, and we notified the Rookie Test monitors that we were ready to begin phase two. They had to make sure the “observers” were in place, and soon they gave us the signal to go. Darrell went out and in a couple of laps got up to and comfortable with the 155MPH required. (we had been timing him and giving him his speed on a chalkboard) He was hitting the speed right on, lap after lap, and the officials were telling us whether they were “good” laps, or not. He got six good laps in a row, and Gordon and I were smiling, thinking we were going to breeze right through phase two. That was not to be, just as Darrell went by on the next lap we heard the engine “sneeze”, and saw a mist of water trailing out from under the engine cover. She had blown the head gaskets again, with only four more laps to go. Our six good laps counted, so we just had to get four more to finish the phase. We had time to get back to the garage and replace the gaskets and get back out because it was still early in the day. We jumped right on it, and got back out with plenty of time to spare. We wanted to get this phase done that day real bad, then we would have all night to try for a better fix on the problem for phase three. A couple of warm up laps, and we were on the clock again, and Dockery got up to speed, and clicked off four more good laps, so we were now shooting for phase three. We were half way home! When he pulled in there was steam rolling out from the engine again. Luckily he had gotten the four laps we needed, because I don’t think it would have made another lap. We didn’t waste any time, we got the car back to the garage and removed the heads, and cleaned everything up so we could try to figure out why this kept happening. The block was flat, and the heads were flat, there were no dowels or anything that were not letting the head gaskets seat. We had several “experts” look things over and offer possible cures for our problem. We got a set of “Donovan” studs from another Chevy team, these were supposed to be “super good” and if we used soft solid copper gaskets that had been annealed, and were real careful torqueing the head bolts we should be in good shape. This sounded good to me because my old buddy Jim Ward and I had done this on some of Bill Simpsons Chevys and had no problems. We got it all put back together, and if we hurried we could get back to Ed and Gerty’s and get a little sleep, after stopping for some “White Castles” on the way of course, and get back early in the morning and make an attempt for phase three as soon as the track was open for rookie tests. Time was getting short, I think that at this point we only had three more days to complete the rookie test.

When they opened the track for rookie tests we were rocking on ready and setting on go, and sent Dockery out. Now he had to run 160, funny, that’s what he was running when he got in the trouble before. He got up to speed right away, and was consistent, and looking good, and each lap was a good one, well, up to lap five anyway. About ¾ of the way down the front straightaway we spotted a spray of water again. That lap counted though because it didn’t sneeze until he had passed the timing line. He made it around, and pulled into the pit, and we could tell he was mad because his face was red and looked like it was going to explode. It was like, “Man, how much more can we take?” Some newspaper guy wrote an article about our situation, it was a positive not negative article, and he called us “dead game pluggers” inferring that we just never gave up, no matter what happened. We had done everything possible to keep this engine running, but now it was time to try something else. We got another engine, hoping it was just something strange with the other one. When the engine was changed, and the track was open for us again, Darrell went back out and again got up to speed, and we were sure that we could easily get the five laps we needed. Again, it was not to be, he got three good laps in and the same thing happened as before. We were two laps short for finishing phase three. As things were going, we were sure that if we did a quick fix we could at least get two laps in, so we went for it. We got back out, but there was not much time before the track would be closed for the day, We got him out just as soon as they would let us, and we got the two laps we needed, but just barely, that sucker spilled it’s guts just after crossing the line. This was incredible, a completely different engine, and still the same problem. We still had to do phase four which was anything over 160 for ten laps, but it seemed like climbing Mount Everest might be easier than this. Fortune smiled on us again though, A fellow named Harold (wish I could remember his name) who was a mechanic for a guy named Boyce Holt who ran Chevys in sprint cars and I think Championship Dirt Cars offered us an engine that metal “O” rings around the cylinders that might solve our problem. They got the engine to us right away, and we had all night if needed to do the change. We got some help doing this, because there were lots of people that had been watching us busting butt to get this rookie thing over with, and were pulling for us. We were even able to get a little sleep that night, and were ready to give it hell the next day. Ha! I think Harold’s name was Cox, if not one of my brothers are going to straighten me out.
Larry

[Double ugly]

Re: Critical Mass - Blind Man's Bluff = SPLIT THREAD

I think we need to do some networking to get a corporate jet lined up for next September. I'll start here in Scottsdale. I may try Dillon Precision but larry knows him well and I don't. This is simply a hint to have him call the guy.
John

[bluffman]

Re: Critical Mass - Blind Man's Bluff = SPLIT THREAD

The Boyce Holt engine was in, and we had high hopes of clicking off ten good laps, and complete the rookie test once and for all. Dockery took the car out for a few warm up laps, and said that it felt strong, plenty of power. After he shut it off, we checked for leaks, and gave the whole car a good looking over. We put on a fresh set of Goodyears, and informed the observers that we were ready to go. Darrell got up to speed right away, and was getting laps at just a click over 160, which was all we needed. He got five good ones, but it didn’t sound quite right as he went past us and into turn one, and down the backstretch he shut it off and coasted around three and four and into the pits. (It just dawned on me that maybe some of you may not know that the Indy track is 2-½ miles around, and it is the long straightaways that our Chevy didn’t like.) We had the same problems with this engine as we had before, the head gaskets had blown, despite the metal ”O” rings. This was unbelievable! We had to get it back to the garage, and do something, anything. This was the last day for the test to be completed. To get the heads off first the ignition distributor had to be removed, then the fuel injection, fuel and water hoses, and finally the cylinder heads. Gordon had talked to somebody about some Chevy “Diesel” head gaskets and got a pair from somewhere, and we put the engine back together using these. It was our last hope, and we had to go for it. We got the beast back out for what would probably be our last possible attempt. “It was now or never.” Darrell got up to the needed speed, and was clicking the laps off, he got four, and Gordon and I had our fingers and everything else crossed, pleading with the “God of Speed” for just one more lap. Darrell made it, it sounded good when he went by and across the timing line, and into turn one. “We had ten good ones!“ Off turn two and onto the backstretch it sounded a little off, and we heard him shut it down, and came coasting into the pits. Darrell was fuming, he was really mad this time! When he saw that Gordon and I were smiling, and obviously happy didn’t set well at all. He must have thought we had finally gone completely nuts. Then I said, “You made it”, and he got a strange look on his face, and said that we were one lap short. He had miscounted the laps, and the engine had blown after he had crossed the timing line. Of course we were singing “Everything is Beautiful” again. Now, we had to try to fix the engine and try to get up to qualifying speed to make the race. We had some time to work with since Indy qualifying is done on two week ends, and we would have a chance to try for yet another fix, and try to qualify on the second week end.

We had pulled the “Rookie Stripes” off, and now we could go onto the track anytime it was open for practice, no more “observers” to deal with. By the following Monday, after the first week end of qualifying was over, we had done another fix on the engine, the metal “O” rings were replaced, and we put a new set of “Donovan” head studs in, and I think new “Diesel” gaskets, but this time we coated them with some kind of hucky puck, not Permatex or “Copper Coat”, but some kind of high temperature stuff. Darrell ran some easy laps at over 162+, and he would come in and we would look things over, and re- torque the heads. I think we did this three times, and each time we would re- torque the heads, and noticed that each time it would take quite a bit to get them up to the specified torque. Obviously we were stretching the studs. Dockery did get a chance to run a few “hot laps” though, and at one point my old buddy Sammy Sessions, and a couple of others came and told us that they had been down in the corners and getting corner speeds, and Darrell had faster corner speeds than Johnny Rutherford, who was running the fastest laps at that time. Our Ol’ car was quick in the turns, but just didn’t have the speed on the straightaways. But we still had the same problems come back to haunt us, blown head gaskets. We could have got more speed with a dose of nitro-methane, but this would have made the gaskets blow quicker. Our goose was cooked! We were setting around the garage, needless to say, a little discouraged. The man who invented and patented the “coolant recovery system” that is on all water cooled cars now was from Phoenix, and we had tested this system on our car. He offered to buy us a Ford 4 Cam Indy engine. We got it, although changing over would be a real chore, but we jumped right on it. Gordon had to make new motor mounts, the wire harness would need to be installed, and much more. I had to build a new engine cover to fit the Ford, and much more. On the last day of qualifying we were almost ready to go. We knew time was running out, but we thought maybe we could make it in time. We backed the car out of the garage, and fired the Ford up to check for leaks and such, and we were ready. We had been too busy to keep track of the time, and just as we were preparing to get the car pushed down to the pits, the gun went off, ending the qualifying, and shutting the track down. “Close, but no cigar!” Al Unser got the pole at 170.221 MPH, and Rutherford was second quick at 170.213MPH. Sammy Sessions was the slowest car in the field at 165.373 MPH. I think that if we had gotten out with the Ford we could have made it. We were only about 3 ½ MPH slower with the Chevy than Sammy . Darrell was ready to head for home, but we talked it over and decided to stay and watch the 500, and go to Milwaukee, Wisconsin and run the race there the week after the 500.
A funny thing about us staying to watch the 500 was that this was Gordon’s first time at Indy and we planned to be down in turn one for the start of the race which was real exciting, watching them come down three abreast, and see who would out- brave the others on the front row as they entered the first turn. The problem was that in our garage there was a storage area at the back that had a curtain to kind of hide parts and pieces. Gordon had slipped up there to take a nap raceday morning, and Darrell and I didn’t know it. When it got to be about time for the race to start Darrell and I left the garage, and locked the door with a pad- lock. We figured that Gordon had left earlier. So, Gordon Cole missed seeing the start of his first Indy 500, but somehow, I don’t recall how he did it, he managed to get out of there to see part of the race. Needless to say, we got a lot of mileage kidding him about this.