Tom Sneva

TOM SNEVA - Indy 500: A Race for Heroes (AUTO RACING DOCUMENTARY)

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TOM SNEVA - Indy 500: A Race for Heroes (AUTO RACING DOCUMENTARY) Tom Sneva holds the distinction of being the first man to circulate the Indianapolis Motor Speedway at more than 200 miles per hour. They called him ‘The Gas Man,’ and his qualifying attempts at IMS in the late 1970s into the ‘80s were always spellbinding. Sneva was a school principal in Spokane, Washington when he moved to Indianapolis to make a full-time career out of racing. He gained fame by winning a series of USAC sprint car races in 1973 using a rear-engine machine that was a Huffaker Indy car converted for sprint car use by Carl Gelhausen. USAC promptly banned rear engine cars in 1974. Sneva qualified for his first Indianapolis 500 in 1974 and his performances throughout that season in a ’72 Eagle copy caught the attention of team owner Roger Penske. Driving for Penske in 1975, Sneva survived one of the most spectacular accidents in the history of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. On the 126th lap of the ‘500,’ Sneva’s Penske-McLaren touched wheels with a car driven by Eldon Rasmussen; Sneva’s burning car flew through the air, captured memorably in a sequence of still photographs. Even in his earliest years at Indianapolis, Sneva’s mastery of the unique four-lap qualification format was evident. He lined up eighth for his initial ‘500’ start in that low-budget Kingfish, started fourth in 1975 and earned his first front row berth in 1976, going on to finish sixth in the rain-shortened race. In 1977, Penske fielded new Cosworth-powered McLaren M24s, and Sneva came through with the first of his three Indianapolis poles. Despite crashing in practice on the day before Pole Day, he set the one-lap record of 200.535 mph and four-lap mark of 198.884, increasing those numbers to 203.620 and 202.156 mph a year later while driving a new Penske PC-6 chassis. Sneva finished second at Indianapolis in both 1977 and ’78 and went on to win the USAC National Championship both years, yet was dismissed by Penske at the end of the 1978 season. “Tom drove for us for a number of years, won the championship, and was a tremendous qualifier,” observed Roger Penske. “Every time I saw him come off of Turn 4 I thought he would never get the thing turned. He drove it right on the edge, and I was really concerned when I saw the accident off of Turn 2 in 1975, when the engine came apart. That was a tragic situation, but fortunately he walked away. “Tom was good for the team, but he and I had some different ideas on how we wanted to go,” Penske added. “He was one of the key drivers that brought us to the next step. He was a smart guy, and I think he understood our methodology, which was important.”