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64
winter
|
spr ing
go.
All
of the hundreds of jump-suited Speedway employees at the various
gates, entrances, passageways, back doors, restricted areas, fences, and
barriers set up to direct traffic away from sensitive areas, knew
immediately
to allow the Granatelli caravan total access. Barriers opened as magically
and as surely as the Red Sea parted for Moses and his entourage.
We drove around the entire 2 ½-mile Indy track in both vans, at will.
Nobody
does that, except the Granatellis. And, I suppose, the Hulman-
Georges.
When our group had the opportunity to take two turns around the
two-and-a-half-mile track individually at speeds in excess of 180mph in
an Indy race car, our driver was another Indy and racing legend:
Mario
Andretti
, who had agreed to drive us as a favor to Andy. Andretti’s son
Michael
had a racing career, and Mario’s grandson, 21-year-old
Marco
Andretti
was set to compete in Sunday’s race. Mario was there to root for
his grandson and to give his daughter (
Barbara “Barbie” Dee
) and god-
daughter
Alexis
a courtesy spin around the track, so it was easy for him
to stay on and treat us to his driving skills. Mario quickly reached our top
speed of 205 mph and came awfully close to “the wall” as he made one of
Among the stars that turned out for this year’s Indy 500
were 1992 Olympic gold-medalist “Kristi” Yamaguchi
Academy Award winner Marlee Matlin and mambo dance
champ Fabian Sanchez
Montecito resident and 1950s/’60s acting-singing star Tab Hunter, seen here with
Andy’s wife, Dolly Granatelli
Jim Nabors, who sang “Back Home Again In Indiana”
Completing his two turns around the Indianapolis’s two-
and-a-half-mile track with Mario Andretti at the wheel is
Montecito Bank & Trust owner-founder Mike Towbes
Slash from Guns ‘N Roses (back, center) and his wife, Perla (on the right)
who’d purchased an auction item at a fundraiser for the Johnson Cancer Institute
for her husband as a birthday present. This was his first time in Indianapolis, but
Slash says he is a race fan.