Pennzoil history at the Indianapolis ‘500’

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The Shell Oil Company’s outdoor display at the 2018 SEMA (Specialty Equipment Market Association) show in Las Vegas featured the #3 Pennzoil-sponsored Dallara IR-12 with the UAK (Universal Aero Kit) IndyCar as driven by Helio Castroneves in the 2018 Indianapolis 500-mile race.

Pennzoil, a division of Shell Oil since 2002, has a long history of involvement at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and IndyCar racing. The company claims to have sponsored the machines of Russell Snowberger and Wilbur Shaw during the nineteen thirties, but the earliest Pennzoil sponsorship the author is aware of at the Indianapolis ‘500’ dates back to 1951, when Pennzoil sponsored the Emil Deidt built front-wheel drive car owned by Howard Keck.

This well-funded effort owned by the Southern California oilman was considered a “super team” at the time as it combined a proven winning car design, a superstar driver, three-time Indianapolis ‘500’ race winner Mauri Rose, and superstar mechanics, the “Whiz Kids” Frank Coon and Jim Travers. The Deidt-built front-drive machine was a later version of the design which Rose had driven earlier for car owner Lou Moore. Moore’s twin Blue Crown Spark Plug front-drive machines dominated the 500-mile race between 1947 and 1950, with three victories and two sweeps of both first and second place.

After Rose’s Blue Crown Special broke a magneto strap and dropped out of the 1949 race with just eight laps to go, he angrily quit Moore’s team and was entered for the 1950 ‘500’ as the driver of Keck’s shiny black unsponsored machine replacing the 1948 and 1949 pilot Jimmy Jackson. Rose started the 1950 ‘500’ on the outside of the front row for the start, led the first nine laps, then led again on two occasions but ultimately finished in third place behind winner Johnnie Parsons and Bill Holland in a Blue Crown Spark Plug Special.

Mauri Rose poses with a can of Pennzoil in 1951

Photo courtesy of the IUPUI University Library

Center for Digital Studies

Indianapolis Motor Speedway Collection

In 1951, Rose who was 45 years on race day with over 5,000 miles of competition at the Speedway to his credit, was entered as the driver of the same sleek black machine but with addition of Pennzoil as the sponsor. Rose was the first driver out for 1951-time trials and wound up fifth fastest to start his fifteenth ‘500,’ but during the 1951 Memorial Day Classic, the car’s right rear wire wheel collapsed on his 126^th lap as Rose entered the fourth turn and the #16 Pennzoil Special slid into the infield, rolled over and came to rest in a drainage ditch.

Pennzoil returned to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in 1979 as the sponsor of the Jim Hall-owned Chaparral 2K designed by John Barnard which made use of the new “ground effects” technology that used the underside of the car to create downforce to hold the machine onto the racing surface.  In 1979 driver Al Unser, the defending champion battled his brother Bobby for the race lead during the first half of the race before the car retired with a broken transmission seal on lap 104.

Johnny Rutherford and his crew pose after qualifying for the 1980 Indy 500

JR's wife Betty (the team's scorer) on the sidepod and car owner Jim Hall in cowboy hat

Photo courtesy of the IUPUI University Library

Center for Digital Studies

Indianapolis Motor Speedway Collection

The updated Pennzoil Chaparral 2K-02 retuned to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in 1980 with a new driver, two-time Indianapolis champion Johnny Rutherford. Rutherford and the machine dubbed the “Yellow Submarine” won the pole position and dominated the race, as Johnny led seven times for a total of 118 laps, which included the final 21 laps. Rutherford would score four other victories during the controversial 1980 co-sanctioned season and was crowned the 1980 CART (Championship Auto Racing Teams) series champion. Rutherford continued to drive the Pennzoil Chaparral in 1981, but in 1982 the Hall team turned to a March 82C chassis.

Rick Mears enroute to victory in the 1988 Indianapolis 500 mile race

Photo courtesy of the IUPUI University Library

Center for Digital Studies

Indianapolis Motor Speedway Collection

Chaparral car owner Jim Hall at the end of the 1982 CART season so for 1983, the Pennzoil sponsorship moved to Penske Racing. Pennzoil was the primary sponsor of the car of Rick Mears the 1979 Indianapolis 500-mile race winner, a pairing which lasted through the 1990 season. The combination resulted in seven CART (Championship Auto Racing Teams) wins and two Indianapolis ‘500’ victories in 1984 and 1988.  In 1984, Rick started third, led a race-high 119 laps, which included the final 56 circuits. In 1988, Mears started from the pole position, after he set new one and four lap records and led the final 77 laps to capture his third ‘500’ title.

Teo Fabi 1993 Indianapolis 500 qualifying photo

Author's personal collection

In late 1990, Jim Hall returned to racing from retirement and Pennzoil moved its sponsorship to the new partnership known as Hall/VDS Racing.  From 1991 to 1993, the Pennzoil machine was driven by John Andretti who won his debut race for Hall/VDS. In 1993 Andretti was replaced by Teo Fabi at Hall/VDS Racing, and beginning with the 1994 season the team was known as Hall Racing as team partner brewery heir Count Rudy Van Der Straten, the VDS part of the team had died in late 1992.  Teo Fabi remained as the team’s driver through the 1994 season but in two seasons, Teo was unable to find the winner’s circle.  In 1995 and 1996, Brazilian Gil DeFerran carried the Pennzoil colors in CART for Jim Hall Racing and scored one race win each season.

With the cataclysmic 1996 split of American open-wheel racing, Pennzoil joined forces with Pagan Racing for partial sponsorship at the Indianapolis 500-mile race. After Jim Hall retired again at the end of the 1996 season, Pennzoil came on board for the full 1997 Indy Racing League (IRL) season with the team owned by Texas oilman Jack Pagan and his son Allan.   

At the end of the 1997 season, Pagan Racing crew chief John Barnes left to form his own team, with five partners, football player Jim Harbuagh, television producer Terry Lingner, Indianapolis car dealer Gary Pedigo, radio personality Mike Griffin, and Indianapolis politician Doug Boles.

The Pennzoil sponsorship followed Barnes to the new team known as Panther Racing, although the entries driven by Scott Goodyear in the 1998, 1999, and 2000 IRL seasons used a non-traditional yellow and black livery.  When Goodyear’s planned teammate for the 1999 Indianapolis ‘500,’ sprint car driver David Steele, was unable to compete due to lingering injuries, Pennzoil provided partial sponsorship to the already-qualified car driven by Tyce Carlson.

Sam Hornish Jr. at Indianapolis 2003

Author's personal collection

Although Goodyear respectively scored three victories in his three seasons with Panther/Pennzoil before he retired, it was his replacement, Sam Hornish Jr. that brought the Panther/Pennzoil team its greatest successes. Hornish won in his debut race with the team at Phoenix International Raceway in 2001, and notched a total of eleven IRL races wins and two IRL driver championship titles in his three seasons in the Pennzoil colors from 2001 to 2003. 

When Hornish moved to Penske Racing for the 2004 season, his seat in the Pennzoil Panther was taken over by 24-year old South African Tomas Scheckter. Over his two seasons with Panther/Pennzoil, Tomas, the son of 1979 Formula One world champion Jody Scheckter was often fast in qualifying but only scored one race win at Texas Motor Speedway where he out-dueled Hornish for the win by .0534 seconds.

Pennzoil remained on the sidelines of IndyCar race team sponsorship from 2006 to 2011, but returned in 2012 with Penske Racing and three-time Indianapolis ‘500’ champion Helio Castroneves as part of the Penske line-up of rotating sponsors. Castroneves carried the Pennzoil colors at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway for the ‘500’ in 2012, 2014, 2016 and 2018.    

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The #3 Dallara IR-12 seen at the 2018 SEMA show is powered by a DOHC Chevrolet Ilmor twin-turbocharged V-6 engine that displaces just 134 cubic inches, but produces up to 700 horsepower at the highest boost level for qualifying for the Indianapolis 500-mile race with Pennzoil Ultra Platinum motor oil in its dry sump oil tank.

  

The 2001 Dallara Indianapolis winner

 

 

The fourth IndyCar car included in the 50th anniversary tribute to Penske Racing at the Performance Racing Industry (PRI) trade show in Indianapolis is the Dallara IR2 owned by the Team Penske Collection. This car was driven to victory in the 2001 Indianapolis 500-mile race by Helio Castroneves.

This was the first Penske race car to reappear at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway after a five race absence due to the second American open-wheel racing split which began with the creation of the Indy Racing League (IRL) on March 11, 1994 to begin competition in 1996.

 

 

IMS President Tony George began to agitate for changes in November 1991, and he continued to push for changes as a non-voting member of the CART board from 1992 to1994.  Eventually frustrated he quit the CART board and formed the IRL 

Roger Penske already unhappy with the split was further  angered when in August 1994 United States Auto Club (USAC) the sanctioning body for the Indianapolis ‘500’ for the second time in three months reduced the allowable maximum boost level for purpose-designed pushrod engines. USAC’s moves relegated the Mercedes-Benz 500I engine which had won the 1994 Indianapolis ‘500’ in dominant fashion to museum status after just one race followed by Penske Racing’s humiliation of failing to qualify for the 1995 Indianapolis ‘500.’

 

 

The nineteen seventies Championship Auto Racing Teams (CART)-USAC split was very divisive, but the CART-IRL split reached new levels of rancor.  No CART teams entered in the 1996 Indianapolis ‘500’ as CART teams claimed they were effectively locked out by new Indianapolis qualifying rules which guaranteed starting positions to the top 25 drivers in IRL points. Although the IRL countered that CART teams were boycotting the ‘500,’ the IRL one-season carry-over rules package for the 1996 ‘500’ would not allow CART teams to use their 1996 Penske, Reynard and Lola chassis.

In retaliation, in December 1995 CART announced the inaugural “U.S. 500” race at Michigan International Speedway to be held on the same day as the 1996 Indianapolis ‘500.’ Neither race was an artistic success, as the Indianapolis ‘500’ 33-car starting field was comprised of 1995 and 1995 Lola and Reynard chassis most of which were bought from CART teams.

The apparent ‘500’ pole position winning car driven by Arie Luyendyk the only former ‘500’ race winner entered was disqualified for being underweight, then a pall was cast over the race when pole-sitter Scott Brayton was killed in a practice crash on May 17. Only nine cars finished the 1996 ‘500’ won by second-generation driver Robert “Buddy” Lazier who drove the race with a broken back

The starting field for the “U.S. 500” which aired live on ESPN2, featured only 27 cars, as two cars withdrew before the race. A nine-car crash before the initial start eliminated at least seven cars and in a bizarre turn of events, CART officials allowed six of the drivers involved in the accident to start the race in their back-up cars. The 250-lap race contested on the wide high-banked 2-mile oval was marred by a remarkably high attrition rate as eleven cars experienced engine failure. Jimmy Vasser won the race and Vanderbilt Trophy replica by eleven seconds over former Formula One driver Mauricio Gugelmin as theirs were the only two cars to complete the entire 500-mile distance.

CART officials considered the 1996 “U.S. 500” a success with a reported 120,000 fans in attendance but never again scheduled the “U.S. 500” directly against the Indianapolis 500-mile race. In January 1997 the IRL unveiled its new cars and engines; competitors used either a Riley & Scott, Dallara or G-Force chassis and had a choice of an Oldsmobile Aurora or Nissan/Infiniti powerplants.

Days before the 1997 Indianapolis ‘500,’ the Indy Racing League abolished its controversial rule that guaranteed 25 of the 33 ‘500’ starting positions to IRL regulars of the new series, but still no CART regulars entered the Indianapolis ‘500’ until 2000. In 2000, after CART became a publicly traded company and competitors began to complain about series mismanagement.

CART car owner Chip Ganassi, who had driven in the Indianapolis ‘500’ five times between 1982 and 1986, assembled a two-car team to compete in one IRL sanctioned race- the 2000 Indianapolis 500. The Ganassi Target team dominated the 2000 ‘500’ as winner Juan Pablo Montoya led 167 of the 200 laps. Although a CART regular team won the race, public sentiment became that the IRL was now winning the championship racing sanction war.

Two other CART regular teams entered the 2001 Indianapolis 500-mile race - Team Penske (formerly known as Penske Racing), and Team Kool Green, while Chip Ganassi returned  with a four-car team sponsored by Target department stores with a driver line-up that counted  NASCAR regular Tony Stewart, Jimmy Vasser, and rookies Bruno Junqueira  and Nicolas Minassian. 

 

 

 

Penske’s 2001 Indianapolis driver lineup in the Oldsmobile-powered Dallara chassis were 2000 CART champion Gil de Ferran who had driven in 1995 “500’ paired with Brazilian Helio who had two years of CART experience but was an Indianapolis rookie.  The 121-inch wheelbase Dallara IR2 (Indy Racing League second generation) was built in Parma Italy of carbon fiber and aluminum honeycomb construction with aluminum wishbone suspension front and rear.  

The 244-cubic inch all-aluminum Oldsmobile Aurora V-8 engine was based on the production engine used in the short-lived (1995-2003) Aurora luxury sedan. The methanol-burning race engine with four valves per cylinder and double overhead camshafts which teams purchased from one of four engine builders for $80,000 produced over 700 horsepower at 10,500 RPM (revolutions per minute).

 

The red square object attached to the rear of the transmission case is

the attenuator designed to absorb the energy of a direct rear engine contact  

 

Both Penske cars appeared in Marlboro-themed livery (neon red and white) sans the Marlboro name and logo at the request of the Indiana Attorney General.  In In time trials, de Ferran who the year before ran the fastest official IndyCar lap ever at over 241 MPH at Auto Club Speedway in Fontana California qualified his #66 in fifth place, while teammate Castroneves qualified eleventh and was the fastest rookie in the 33-car starting field  

After a start led by John Mellencamp’s then-wife Elaine behind the wheel of an Oldsmobile Bravada sport-utility vehicle (SUV), the early stages of the 2001 Indianapolis 500 were marred by three crashes in the first twenty laps which eliminated four cars. Rain fell on lap 107 and the field was slowed under caution flag with CART regular Michael Andretti in the lead. After the race resumed De Ferran took the lead for the first time and held on until lap 136 when he made a pit stop under caution.

On lap 148 rains returned with Tony Stewart in the lead but he pitted the following lap under the caution flag which handed the lead to Castroneves.  The rain then became heavy enough that it brought out the red flag and officials stopped the race for seventeen minutes on lap 155 with Helio’s #68 in the lead. After the lap 157 restart, Robbie Buhl grandson of legendary mechanic and car builder Floyd “Pop” Dreyer battled Castroneves for the lead, but Buhl spun and hit the wall on lap 166.

 

Buhl’s elimination moved De Ferran into second place and when the green flag flew again the two Penske drivers cruised through the final laps to complete a sweep of the top two positions. Castroneves’ ‘500’ win was the ninth for a rookie driver and Roger Penske’s eleventh. After his victory lap, Helio stopped on the main straightaway and climbed the outer crash fencing. CART drivers took the top six finishing positions in the 2001 Indianapolis ‘500.’

For the 2002 season, Team Penske competed with the Indy Racing League, followed by Ganassi Racing and Andretti/Green Racing in 2003 after Federal Express pulled their sponsorship of the CART series at the 2002 racing season.  Honda and Toyota switched their engine supply from CART to the IRL after 2002. CART declared bankruptcy after the 2003 off-season and the assets of CART were liquidated.

 

 

The Champ Car World Series (CCWS) continued on after CART’s failure until CCWS’ bankruptcy in 2008 and its assets were sold at auction on June 3, 2008. For the 2008 racing season, after twenty-nine years of turmoil, American open-wheel racing was finally reunited under one banner.

The Dallara IR2 /Oldsmobile on display at the PRI show is part of the Team Penske Collection and is usually shown in the Penske Racing Museum in Scottsdale Arizona.     

All photos by the author