Indy 500 : 1984

1984 Indianapolis 500 – (140 min)

The 68th running of the Indianapolis 500 would often be remembered for the vicious crash of Patrick Bedard on lap 58.
Bedard’s car slammed into the inside wall, and ended up in pieces scattered all over the track. Luckily, Bedard would
survive this scary accident (albeit with a few injuries), ending his career as an Indy driver, but he would continue his work
with Car And Driver Magazine for the next 25 years.

Tom Sneva was on pole, his teammate Howdy Holmes next to him, and Rick Mears would qualify third, placing him on the
outside of row 1. Other drivers on the gird included Michael and Mario Andretti, Gordon Johncock, Geoff Brabham, Al
Unser Jr, Bobby Rahal, Al Unser Sr, Chip Ganassi, Roberto Guerrero, and F1 drivers Teo Fabi and Emerson Fittipaldi.

During the first half of the race the lead was exchanged between Rick Mears, Danny Ongais, Teo Fabi, Mario Andretti,
and Tom Sneva. Around lap 70, the racetrack DataSpeed Scoring System failed, and laps had to be counted manually by
scorers. At the halfway point, Tom Sneva led, followed by Al Unser Jr, Rick Mears, Mario Andretti, and Michael Andretti.
On lap 103, Gordon Johncock slapped the outside wall in turn 4, then careened across the track down pit lane, narrowly
missing pit crew members. Johncock injured his ankle, and would have to be assisted from his car. Rick Mears would
cruise to victory by over 2 laps as top running cars fell to mechanical problems.

This is an original ABC-Sports broadcast, on tape delay, which is how they used to always broadcast the Indy 500 in
order to get prime time coverage. The commentators are Jim McKay and Sam Posey, the host of the telecast is Jackie
Stewart, Chris Economaki handled pit lane. Several produced segments were aired within this broadcast to fill in for dull
moments, or the occasional long yellow flag or rain delay. Amongst them was a feature on the new 1984 Corvette digital
dashboard (hosted by Jackie Stewart), a segment on Paul Newman’s racing career, and an “at home with” segment with
Rick Mears and his dad, Roger Mears. The Pace Car for this race was the Pontiac Fiero.