My friend and co-worker, WWII Vet. William C. "Spider" Webb was the driver in the #39 Miller-Ford FWD Grancor Spl. He broke a transmission shaft early on... RIP Bill.... J.C.
I was six years old and saw most of these cars at Milwaukee the week following. I specifically remember the six wheel car. I had a toy of Ted Horn and his Maserati;
Thank you for sharing this! Moore's Blue Crown team was always one of my favourites. One of the first "super teams", with cars designed especially for Indianapolis.
One fascinating thing about this race was that, in victory lane, it was discovered that the windshield of Mauri Rose's car, at some point in the race, was struck by debris hit by another car he was right behind, debris that, if it had been a few inches higher when Rose's car hit it, could have had devastating consequences for Rose.
I met Johnny Mauro during my time working at the track in the 1990's. He explained that he fell a lap down because his gloves had become too tight during the race and they had to cut them off because he was losing circulation.
Over the years, it's been amusing that actual race time has shortened noticeably. When speeds reach 300mph, the Indy500 may only take a little more than an hour and a half! LOL! ... Waiting for when cars 'lose their wheels' and turn into Star Wars Landspeeders and are powered by a 'Mr. Fusion Home Energy Reactor'.
In another article, Nalon, who credited noboby but GOD for getting him out of that 1949 crash alive, said words to the effect that the Novis were "jinxed. You maybe don't believe in the jinx until you start experiencing it yourself, but these cars were jinxed." But Indy IS a place where all SORTS of nutty stuff can & does happen!
Why is this music in this otherwise great video? I'm also puzzled, like the early English sports cars,chopping out the entrance or the doors. This absolutely makes no since. I love these but can't figure out why they built them without safety in mind.
The 6-wheeler placed 12th! 😂 But of course, this was the closest a Novi ever came to winning the race. I wonder if the "fuel faux pas" was due to driver/crew error or if Novis were also gas hogs even for racing engines! Juan Fangio said characteristics of the superchargers made them hard to drive, Nalon said it took HIM 89 laps to learn the "feel" of the Novi, & EVERYONE back then knew they were hard on tires! Still, to run down the Blue Crown cars of those days & lead for 14 laps "running away," & still finish 3rd after a pit-schedule DISASTER said a lot about those cars! Another piece on here said that the Novi engine made 5hp per cubic INCH!!! 😲🤑🤓
more than likely this was an amateur film (judging by the quality of the picture)...so it was a silent film anyway. We still had silent film camera's into the early 70's.
