The cars of the 1996 Indy 500

Photo Credit: IMS Photo

The Gist
In this three-part series, SK Chow chronicles the fascinating stories behind the lineage of cars
which made up the 1996 #indy500 which was sanctioned by the IRL but used old CART
equipment.

By: SK Chow
@iamskchow
October 30, 2020

Foreword:
In the years leading up to The Split, the march of technology at Indy was chronicled
in great detail by Carl Hungness in his famed yearbooks. One detail that Hungness
typically included in his yearbooks was the racing record for each chassis that
qualified for the “500”. Unfortunately, the politics at the time meant that Hungness
was disallowed access to the Speedway’s photographs and records in 1996. Therefore,
we do not have a single place with the histories of the cars. It is particularly sad that
this would occur during the one year that most cars had stories to tell!

And so, I hope to bring together the backstories of those cars in this article, using
information gathered from official IMS trackside notes, newspaper articles, and
recollections of those who were there. These are the stories of the 49 cars that made it
on track during May 1996, from the mighty Lola-Menards to the ancient Lola-Buicks,
and everything in between.

“The Split”
It was like getting caught in an earthquake.

For fans and competitors of American motor racing, the spring of 1996 was a sudden
rupture of the landscape. What was once so familiar was being swept away, and after
two decades of ever-increasing success, the sport was dealing with the fallout of what
would be known as “The Split.” One championship had become two, and the result
was a bitter feud between two camps.
On one side was the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, the venue of the famed 500-mile
race. The Speedway had recently created a new series, the Indy Racing League (IRL),
which was meant to reduce costs and create opportunities for American oval track
drivers at the top level of the sport. The new series, which centered around the
Indianapolis 500, planned to adopt a radically new, cheaper formula with normally
aspirated production-based engines and chassis that came from three approved
constructors. But this new formula wasn’t ready for 1996, and instead of delaying the
start of the series, the IRL allowed Indy cars built from 1991 to 1995 to compete in its
inaugural races in 1996.

Buddy Lazier won the race in this Reynard 95I which used to be a Ganassi car.
(Photo: Mike Burrell)
One of the earliest supporters of this new series was Team Menard, which had
invested heavily in the development of the Menard V6 engine over several years. For
years an “Indy-only” competitor, Menard ran the powerful but unreliable stock-block
Buick V6 before taking over development of the engine when Buick officially
withdrew from the sport. By 1995, Menard was virtually alone in campaigning a
stock-block engine, while most other competitors leased their power units from Ford
Cosworth, Mercedes-Benz/Ilmor and Honda. However, the team had proven their
speed during the 1995 Indianapolis 500, taking two spots on the front row and
completing all 500 miles with Arie Luyendyk, in their famed “humpback” Lola cars.

Although the IRL did not allow any Indy cars newer than the 1995 model year in its
first season, Menard signaled that they would be a serious competitor by purchasing
new (but ’95-spec) Lola cars to supplement their existing fleet of four cars. While
most IRL teams had planned on running “used” machinery for 1996, team owner John
Menard told Robin Miller of the Indianapolis Star that “Lola is going to improve on
what they’ve got... Indy is still the most important race, and Lola wants to win it so
they’ll do some things to make [the car] faster.”
While Menard was putting together the ingredients to contend for an Indy win, some
entrants were happy just to have the opportunity to make it to the Speedway. Take the
example of Loop Hole Racing, a tiny outfit owned by Bud and Dave Hoffpauir from
Colorado. They entered a ‘91 Lola that was originally raced by Danny Sullivan with
an Alfa Romeo motor. Subsequently, it was sold to Leader Card Racers and raced in
the 1992 Indy 500 by Buddy Lazier. At the end of 1994, the car was sold to the
Hoffpauirs for $35,000. The car was converted into a Pikes Peak hill climb racer and
completed the climb in 9 minutes with former champion David Donner at the wheel.
Remarkably, it was also entered in the American IndyCar Series, a lower-tier series
that used old Indy cars, winning three races during this period. Finally, the car was
tested at Phoenix in 1996 before running in official practice at the Speedway as #36.
Scott Brayton won the pole for the second year in a row, but was tragically killed in a practice
crash. (Photo: IMS)

Dan Drinan, who was assigned to drive the Loop Hole entry, represented the kind of
personality that the Speedway wanted to promote. He himself had an interesting path
to the 500: a mechanic in his past career, having worked on Mario Andretti’s
championship winning car in 1984, and subsequently with Michael Andretti, Scott
Brayton and Tom Sneva. Drinan himself then became a driver in USAC midgets and
Silver Crowns.

Menard and Loop Hole represented two extremes in the entry list for the 1996
Indianapolis 500. The list was a diverse collection of ‘92 Lolas next to ‘95 Reynards,
Ford Cosworth V8 vs. Menard V6, and a solitary Mercedes-Benz/Ilmor entry. The
teams were a mix of the familiar, such as longtime participants A.J. Foyt Enterprises
and Hemelgarn Racing, and rookie teams, such as Bradley Motorsports and Della
Penna Motorsports.

But there was a very significant group of competitors that were not on the list.
Mechanic-turned-driver Dan Drinan practiced in his 5-year-old Lola-Buick at Phoenix before
heading to Indy. (Photo: IMS)

“The Stars and Cars” are missing from the Speedway

Walker Racing had just completed a successful 1995 Indy car season, with two race
wins courtesy of their exciting young driver named Robby Gordon. Gordon had also
done well to finish fifth at Indianapolis. But he would be caught on the other side of
the “Split” in 1996.

Most of the established Indy car teams of the era competed in the national
championship series sanctioned by Championship Auto Racing Teams (CART). Since
the early 1980s, CART had aligned their technical regulations to allow their teams to
participate in the Indianapolis 500, which had been separately sanctioned by the
United States Auto Club during that time. But this alignment would come to an end as
the IRL forged ahead with its plans for the new formula for the Indianapolis 500 and
the rest of its new series, in direct conflict with CART’s plan to continue with its
current turbocharged formula.
Walker Racing’s Mike Groff in a ‘95 Reynard-Ford, alongside Eddie Cheever in a ‘95 Lola-
Menard. (Photo: IMS)

Those CART teams that wished to compete in the Indianapolis 500 would have to
keep their ‘95 cars alongside their ‘96 cars (most of the teams had to purchase ’96 cars
due to new technical regulations for CART). However, the prospect of facing the
“25/8 rule” proved to be the biggest point of contention for the CART teams. In order
to encourage participation in the fledgling series, the IRL had implemented a rule
which guaranteed 25 starting spots at the Indianapolis 500 to IRL series points
holders, with only the remaining 8 spots open to other competitors (including any
CART teams that did not participate in the other IRL rounds). This rule played a
major role in CART’s decision to stage the U.S. 500 at Michigan International
Speedway on the same day, along with all the “star” drivers such as two-time Indy
winners Al Unser, Jr. and Emerson Fittipaldi, and former champions Michael Andretti
and Bobby Rahal. Only two teams managed to “cross the picket line” and attempt
both races.
Walker’s star driver and new Reynards would compete at the U.S. 500 as part of their
obligations as a CART entrant. The team had already sold a couple of ‘95 Reynards to
IRL teams, but at least one chassis remained in their arsenal and would be legal to
race at Indianapolis. In deference to their primary sponsors, Walker decided to enter
the race with one of their Valvoline-liveried chassis for Mike Groff.
Galles Racing, likewise, attempted to race in both the Indy 500 and U.S. 500. The
team’s new CART driver was the former motorcycle World Champion Eddie Lawson,
who would face his first 500-mile superspeedway race at Michigan. In contrast,
Galles’s Indianapolis 500 program would feature Davy Jones, a veteran of four
Indianapolis 500 races. For Indy, the team entered a pair of ‘95 Lola-Mercedes/Ilmor,
which would have been driven by either Adrian Fernandez or Marco Greco during the
1995 season. (It has been suggested that it is likely ex-Fernandez given the car was
fitted with the same rear-facing camera pod also seen on Fernandez’s car during
1995.) The Galles team had the only Mercedes/Ilmor engines in the field, due to the
fact that Ilmor (which was founded by CART owner Roger Penske) refused to supply
any IRL teams with engines. However, this lone Mercedes/Ilmor was certainly not
lacking in performance; it became the first car to set a new 1-lap and 4-lap track
record during qualifying for the 1996 race, and eventually finished 2nd in the race.

Galles Racing's Davy Jones would be in the lone Mercedes Benz

One longtime CART team uniquely raced in both the IRL and CART, but skipped the
U.S. 500 in favor of Indy. Team Scandia, which had raced in CART since the early-
1980s as Dick Simon Racing before being bought by Andy Evans in 1996, was one of
the first teams to sign up for the new series. Already known for having a large fleet at
recent Indianapolis 500s, the team lived up to its reputation with eight running cars, of
which three were ‘94 Lolas, four were ‘95 Lolas and one was a newly-acquired ‘95
Reynard. Except for the Reynard, all these cars were likely the same ones that raced in
1995 and 1994 or served as backup cars for Simon. In particular, it is known that
Alessandro Zampedri’s ‘95 Lola was the same one that Lyn St. James raced in 1995
before getting caught up in the first lap accident.

A source told me that Michele Alboreto’s Reynard was reported to be an ex-Team

Green car on one of the radio broadcasts during the year. I have not yet been able to
find this radio snippet, but a distinctive cut-out inlet on the Scandia Reynard’s sidepod
cover matches one that was only seen on Jacques Villeneuve’s #27 race car
throughout 1995. If this is correct, there is a nice coincidence that Alboreto also
famously campaigned the #27 Ferrari in Formula 1, having taken an entry that once
belonged to the late Gilles Villeneuve, father of Jacques!

Although I’m still looking for more evidence to support this, I am fairly confident that Michele
Alboreto’s car belonged to Team Green in 1995. (Photo: Mike Burrell)
Team Scandia would ultimately quit the CART series after the 1996 season, firmly
committing itself as an IRL team. Scandia would join A.J. Foyt Enterprises as the two
major “defectors” to the new series. Foyt had already chosen to race exclusively in the
IRL in 1996, having spoken favorably of the series’ all-oval schedule and its goal of
being more cost effective. The team entered two ‘95 Lolas and two ‘94 Lolas for the
Indianapolis 500. Davey Hamilton’s ‘95 chassis was the same one used by Eddie
Cheever in 1995. This means that the other ‘95 Lola, which was raced by Scott Sharp
in 1996, may have been the same car that he previously raced in 1995! Finally, Marco
Greco’s Lola, being a ‘94 model, was likely Bryan Herta’s ride in 1994.
No other CART team - including Penske, Newman/Haas, and Ganassi - would appear
at Indianapolis in 1996. Alas, the deepening rift between the series meant that the
increasingly sophisticated CART machinery would never appear at Indy again.

The 239 mph rocket: the technological pinnacle

Given the absence of any 1996 CART-spec cars and the “lower-tech” IRL formula
that would begin in 1997, the 1996 Indianapolis 500 might well be considered the
pinnacle of “Indy 500” car development, the end of a virtually unbroken thread of
technical evolution at the Speedway since the inaugural race in 1911. With the limited
amount of development that continued to take place on the ‘95 models between 1995
and 1996, as well as continued development of tires due to the Firestone vs. Goodyear
“tire war,” some of the cars that showed up in 1996 were arguably the fastest race cars
that ever drove onto the Speedway. One of those cars is still the fastest to this day.

Near the end of 1995, Jonathan Byrd, Fred Treadway and Andreas Leberle pooled
together resources for an entry that would maximize the potential of the ‘95-spec
formula. Byrd was a longtime entrant of Indy-only entries and Leberle was the owner
of the Project Indy team which had entered CART races since 1994. Treadway was an
Indianapolis-based businessman who had been involved with Project Indy in 1995 but
was frustrated with racing towards the back of the pack; he now had ambitions to field
a “championship team.”
After the Orlando race, Leberle split from the partnership but left the team with a ‘94
Reynard, which promptly won the second IRL race at Phoenix with Arie Luyendyk.
This car soon became legendary as the all-time lap record holder with Luyendyk at the
wheel and Tim Wardrop providing the engineering “magic.” This car’s history with
the Forsythe-Green and Project Indy teams has been investigated in considerable
detail in Henri Greuter’s article for 8W, so I will not repeat it here. However, I find it
fascinating that this record car had actually entered the month as Luyendyk’s back-up.
A newer ‘95 Reynard was Luyendyk’s primary car at Indy until it was determined to
be slower than the ‘94 Reynard due to an unknown reason. The '95 Reynard was
acquired from Walker Racing and likely served as a backup car for Walker in 1995.

Meanwhile, Leberle continued to enter races in the IRL under the Project Indy banner,
first with a ‘93 Lola at Phoenix and then with a ‘95 Reynard at Indianapolis. The ‘93
Lola was likely the same chassis that was campaigned throughout the 1994 season and
then finished a sensational 7th place at the 1995 Grand Prix of Miami with Christian
Danner. The ‘95 Reynard was the same car that nearly won the Indianapolis 500 in
1995 with Scott Goodyear, albeit now with Ford Cosworth power instead of Honda.
You might say that Andreas Leberle was certainly on the look-out for rocketships that
year!

Arie Luyendyk’s Reynard 94I might have been even faster if it had a Honda engine.
(Photo: Don Sklenka)
The stock block “grenades” enjoy their best chance

Luyendyk’s primary competition for outright speed came from the team he had driven
for in the prior year. Menard’s 1996 entries included the very fast pair of cars that
took the top two starting spots for the 1995 Indianapolis 500. In particular, the chassis
that Luyendyk qualified 2nd and finished 7th in 1995 continued to be highly effective
in 1996 by taking pole position with Scott Brayton. After Brayton tragically lost his
life in a practice accident, the car was taken over by Danny Ongais, who raced it to
7th place.

Although team manager Larry Curry stated that there were six ‘95 Lola-Menard cars
ever built, it appears that seven actually ran during the month; with one remaining
chassis reportedly unassembled at the shop. Four of the cars qualified and raced, one
car was withdrawn after qualifying (in a bid for a higher starting position with the
previously mentioned car), one was tragically involved in Scott Brayton’s fatal crash,
and the last one was briefly used as a warm-up car for Ongais, when he was brought
into the team to replace Brayton.

Tony Stewart was on the pace all month in this ‘95 Lola-Menard. (Photo: IMS)
The history of stock block engines at Indianapolis is a fascinating one, and Greuter
covers it in his excellent piece for 8W. In short, there had been several noteworthy
attempts to race these powerful but unreliable engines throughout the 1980s, but a
manufacturer-supported Buick V6 program in 1991 and 1992 developed the engine
into a serious competitor, taking the fastest qualifying speeds in both years and a 3rd
place finish in 1992. Nonetheless, the engine was uncompetitive outside of Indy due
to CART’s allowance of lower boost at their races, and Buick withdrew its support
and handed over the engine program to Menard for 1993.

The Lola cars that Team Menard subsequently ran in 1993 and 1994 would reappear
in 1996, now in the hands of “customer” teams that were making their debut at Indy.
Despite being three years old, all of these cars lapped comfortably above the
minimum 220 mph average required to qualify; in fact, John Paul Jr. and Johnny
Parsons qualified faster than Team Menard had managed with the same cars in 1994,
likely due to the track repaving and improved tires.
PDM Racing was the frontrunner of the ‘93 Lola-Menard group. The team was
headed by Paul Diatlovich, a chief mechanic whose experience in Indy car racing
began in 1977 and included an impressive run of cars prepared for four consecutive
Rookies of the Year at Indy in the late 1980s. Their Lola, which was originally Geoff
Brabham’s ‘93 Menard ride and now belonged to John Paul, Jr., was repainted in a hot
flames livery and prepared in the former shop of the legendary car builder A.J.
Watson from Leader Card Racers.

Blueprint Racing, from Blue Island, Illinois, acquired two ‘93 Lola-Menard cars in
late 1995. This new team was owned by Ed Rachanski, who had experience
rebuilding Offy racing engines in the 1980s and owned an aircraft engine rebuilding
business. This same team, incidentally, would produce a shock victory at the
following year’s race at Phoenix, defeating the very team that had provided them the
equipment to enter the IRL!

Brickell Racing also had one ‘93 Lola, said to be the one raced by Nelson Piquet in
1993. However, this car narrowly failed to qualify despite efforts by PDM Racing to
get it up to speed. Indeed, the level of camaraderie was such that it was not
uncommon to see crew members from one team helping other teams.
Seen here in 1995, this Reynard 95I infamously lost the 1995 Indianapolis 500 when Scott
Goodyear was penalized from the lead after passing the pace car on a late restart. The car
returned in 1996 with Johnny Unser, who did not start the race due to a mechanical problem.
(Photo: IMS)

Tales of the thoroughbred machinery

While the ‘93 Lola-Menard contingent enjoyed reasonably competitive machinery, a
number of teams ran older chassis with the standard stock-block Buick V6 engine.
There were ten such entries, of which seven ran during the month and one qualified
for the race. While these power plants were no longer supported by the manufacturer
since 1992, they nonetheless continued to be built by various engine builders.

Three of these Lola-Buicks came from the American IndyCar Series. The
aforementioned ‘91 Lola of Loop Hole Racing saw the most action; the ex-Alfa, ex-
Pikes Peak racer was utilized by Tyce Carlson, Andy Michner and Dan Drinan to get
through the Rookie Orientation Program. Drinan managed to get the car up to 215
mph before suffering an accident that destroyed the car.
Another AIS competitor, Tempero-Giuffre Racing, entered a ‘91 and a ‘92 Lola. Both
cars struggled to get to competitive speeds. Joe Gosek, a super-modified champion
and Indy rookie who drove both cars, was quoted in the Hungness yearbook that “We
weren’t even fast enough to develop a baseline setup. I couldn’t tell if the car had a
push or if it needed to be freed up to get through the corners.” Gosek reached a 196
mph average in the ‘91 Lola and 206 mph in the ‘92 Lola, before switching to a
backup Team Scandia car, which he described as going from a “junker” to a
“Cadillac.”

Joe Gosek struggled with this ‘91 Lola-Buick before jumping to a more competitive ride.
(Photo: IMS)

The AIS cars were much maligned by critics of the series; an easy target for their lack
of speed and dubious preparation. However, they should not detract from several other
Lola cars of similar vintage that had some interesting pedigree.
Pagan Racing entered a ‘92 Lola-Buick with a particularly strong history; in fact, it
entered the month of May 1996 as the reigning lap record holder from Roberto
Guerrero’s pole run in 1992. This Lola had also been entered by Pagan in the 1993
and 1994 Indy 500s. In 1993, it was Jeff Andretti’s backup car, and in 1994, it was
raced by Guerrero but crashed out early in the race. In 1996, this car was loaned to the
Speedway to be offered to anyone who needed an opportunity to pass the ROP.
However, only Billy Boat utilized the car for this purpose before attempting to qualify
in one of the team’s newer cars.
Scott Harrington entered a ‘92 Lola that A.J. Foyt had originally used in his final 500,
then sold to Dale Coyne, who entered the car in 1993 for Eric Bachelart with a tribute
livery to the Marmon Wasp. After Bachelart crashed the car practicing for the 1993
Indy 500, the car became a show car before finally making its way to Harrington in
1996. Harrington had made some personal sacrifices to purchase the car; he had sold
his vintage Porsche 911 to raise the funds necessary to buy the tub and “boxes of
assorted parts.” The reasonably prepared car, which journalist Curt Cavin described as
“clean as any on the Speedway’s grounds,” got to nearly 210 mph in practice before a
crash on the Thursday before the second qualifying weekend. Harrington then struck a
deal to race Richie Hearn’s backup Reynard instead.

Although A.J. Foyt (seen here) would make his final start in the 1992 Indianapolis 500, his ‘92
Lola was just getting started. It would eventually find its way to Scott Harrington who practiced
with it in 1996. (Photo: IMS)
The new ABF Motorsports team, owned by Art Bouilliane and Bill Warner, entered a
‘92 Lola-Buick that was previously raced at Indy by Scott Brayton in 1992 and
Stephan Gregoire in 1993, then practiced by Dean Hall and Tero Palmroth in 1995.
Darrell Soppe, who had previously worked at Penske and Newman-Haas before
working with Buick’s engine program, engineered the car, and Louie Gennuso, lead
mechanic, turned it into an immaculate machine. Their efforts were rewarded when
Paul Durant qualified in excess of 225 mph, and the team was awarded a $5,000
"Overachiever" Award for achieving “the greatest qualifying success with limited
resources.”

Randy Tolsma and McCormack Motorsports were not as lucky. Intriguingly, the team
installed a Buick engine into a ‘93 Lola originally built for the more compact Ilmor
engine (likely the same chassis used by Claude Bourbonnais in several CART events
in 1994). The engine cover was visibly modified to fit the engine.
To cap off the project, Tolsma himself designed the livery and hand painted the
lettering onto the car. This untried chassis-engine combination appeared on track
during the second week of practice, but during a last-minute bid to get to qualifying
speed, Tolsma unfortunately spun and damaged the car, ending his month of May.
Continue to part 3
A new opportunity for the “Indy-only” operations
One group of competitors that the Indy Racing League had in mind were the lower-
budget teams that, in recent years, could only scrape together an Indy-only program.
With engine leases and increasingly sophisticated technology becoming more of a
financial burden on teams that could not commit to a full season, the IRL sought to
make it a viable proposition for a team to race cheaply and competitively in events
outside Indy.

Hemelgarn Racing had been a full-time competitor in CART during the 1980s, but
scaled back to become an “Indy-only” team by the early 1990s. Having committed to
the IRL, they made a serious bid to be competitive by purchasing two ‘95 Reynards
from Chip Ganassi while entering another ‘94 Reynard that was likely the same one
that was acquired in 1995 from Hayhoe Racing after Davey Hamilton crashed his
primary car. On the other hand, Buddy Lazier’s winning car was the same one that
Jimmy Vasser had crashed in 1995, but it showed immediate pace in 1996 by winning
the pole position at the inaugural IRL race at Orlando.
Buddy Lazier’s Reynard 95I is now on display at the IMS Museum. (Photo: Don Sklenka)

Pagan Racing entered a ‘95 and ‘94 Reynard, as well as the aforementioned ‘92 Lola.
The ‘95 Reynard was purchased from Forsythe Racing prior to the start of the 1996
season and became Roberto Guerrero’s race car for the 1996 Indy 500. The ‘94
Reynard had been raced by Michael Andretti at Indy in 1994 with Chip Ganassi
Racing. Originally Ford-Cosworth powered, the chassis was sold to Galles Racing and
converted to Ilmor power. It was sold again to Pagan at the beginning of 1995 to be
raced by Guerrero at Indy. Following the 1995 season, the car was reconverted to
Ford-Cosworth (“a rather expensive undertaking” according to owner Allan Pagan)
and raced at the first two rounds of the 1996 IRL season. Billy Boat qualified this ‘94
Reynard for the 1996 Indy 500 but was bumped from the field.

In May 1994, Al Unser Sr. practiced in this ‘94 Lola before retiring from the sport. The car did
not qualify again in 1995. It finally saw the green flag in 1996 with Robbie Buhl, who raced to
9th place. (Photo: IMS)
Beck Motorsports entered two ‘94 Lola cars for Robbie Buhl and Hideshi Matsuda.
Buhl’s car was originally with Arizona Motorsports and had served as Al Unser Sr.’s
final ride in 1994 and then failed to qualify with Jeff Ward in 1995. The other chassis
was originally with Dick Simon/Team Scandia, then sold to Leigh Miller, who entered
the first two races in 1996 with driver Stan Wattles. After Wattles was injured during
the Phoenix weekend, the car was sold to Beck, along with the “guaranteed spot” for
the race under the Speedway’s controversial “25/8” rule.
This ex-Miller car was ultimately used by Matsuda. In turn, the ‘94 Lola that Matsuda
had raced in 1995 for Beck had been sold to Zunne Group Racing and served as Lyn
St. James’s car for 1996. Interestingly, St. James’s car had originally started life as a
Firestone test car in 1994 but ended its career on Goodyears!

The new teams with serious intentions

This leaves three other new teams for 1996: Della Penna Motorsports, Bradley
Motorsports, and Cunningham Motorsports, none of whom had previously raced at
Indianapolis or in the CART series. But their use of ‘95 Reynard chassis clearly
showed their intention to be taken seriously.

Della Penna Motorsports had just won the Toyota Atlantic championship with Richie
Hearn, and both the team and driver were looking to graduate to the top level of the
sport for 1996. Their effort to become contenders in the IRL series included acquiring
a ‘95 Reynard chassis from Arciero-Wells Racing that was previously used by Hiro
Matsushita. Their other chassis had belonged to Forsythe Racing in 1995 and was the
same car that Teo Fabi previously raced at Indy, finishing 8th in 1995. Hearn
expressed a preference for the ex-Matsushita chassis and would race it to 3rd place in
1996. The ex-Fabi car was provided to Scott Harrington.
Richie Hearn had a competitive month in this ex-Hiro Matsushita ‘95 Reynard-Ford.
(Photo: IMS)

The Bradley team had spent the last few years in Indy Lights with Buzz Calkins, and
although they never won in that category, moved up to the IRL for 1996 and made an
immediate impact by winning the inaugural race at Orlando. Their one Reynard
chassis was acquired from Walker Racing and was the same car that Christian
Fittipaldi drove to 2nd place in the prior year’s Indy 500.

Della Penna and Bradley carried the new Ford Cosworth XB Series 2 engines, while
most of the other entries, including the winning Lazier car, used Series 1.5, which at
the time was regarded as the more reliable power plant.

The Cunningham team, which had previously won an IMSA championship with their
factory-supported Nissan 300ZX, purchased a new ‘95 chassis from Reynard in kit
form. The team had instructed Johnny O’Connell to avoid damaging the car during the
first two races of the season in order to “save it for Indy” and only had 955 miles of
mileage heading into the month of May.
Ghost entries
Some notes for those who may be keeping count of the cars so far: Of the 28 entries
that did not appear on track, most of them were additional entries to the teams
previously mentioned in this article, and probably represented incomplete cars or
entries filed to obtain additional garage space for primary entries.

Some teams had previously competed at Indianapolis but did not appear at the
Speedway at all. These included Euromotorsport (entering under the Osella USA
banner), Arizona Motor Sport (which sold at least one of its cars to Beck) and Burns
Motorsports.

Treadway also had an ‘94 Reynard entry named after Average Joe’s Pub and Grub, a
sports bar that was owned by Fred Treadway himself. However, based on inquiries
with Average Joe’s (still in business as of 2020!) and Byrd Racing, an actual car with
this sponsorship did not exist.

To what extent did CART enable the IRL by “selling off their old cars”?
To the best of my knowledge, these were the transactions that occurred between
CART teams and IRL teams before the 1996 Indy 500. All these represented sales of
Reynard 95I chassis.

Seller (CART team) Purchaser (car 1) Purchaser (car 2)

Forsythe Racing Pagan Racing Della Penna Motorsports*
Arciero-Wells Racing Della Penna Motorsports*
Tasman Motorsports Group Project Indy*
Walker Racing Bradley Motorsports Byrd/Treadway Racing
Team Green Team Scandia*
Chip Ganassi Racing Hemelgarn Racing Hemelgarn Racing

Of the 49 cars that practiced for the 1996 Indy 500, 9 cars (18%) were recently sold
by a CART team to an IRL team, although the definition of “IRL team” is somewhat
blurry. The asterisk (*) denotes the teams that ran a partial season in CART during
1996. Scandia would convert into a full IRL team, while Della Penna and Project Indy
left the IRL after 1996 and became full-time CART teams in 1997.
On the other hand, 33 cars (or 67%) were brought over directly by the “defecting”
teams (led by Foyt, Menard and Simon/Scandia) either to use themselves or sell to
other teams who were starting up in the IRL. Most of these were reasonably
competitive cars that were from 1993 or newer. Menard and Simon/Scandia appeared
to have been the main parties who sold or leased cars to upstart teams, but several
other cars also transferred hands between various Indy one-off teams. Included in this
total are also the five new cars that were reportedly ordered from Lola and Reynard.

The three cars from the AIS made up 6% of the entry list. Although these cars could
ultimately trace their origins to a CART team, they were more recently running in the
AIS and were unlikely to have been specifically purchased for the 1996 IRL
campaign, so I do not count these as part of a CART “sell-off.”

The old Lola that Harrington purchased had been a show car, but I do not know
whether he had purchased it from Dale Coyne (the last team that raced the car) or
another source.

Davey Hamilton drove this ‘95 Lola in the classic Copenhagen livery. (Photo: IMS)
Finally, there were three cars that were entered by Walker and Galles, the only two
full-time CART teams that participated in the ‘96 Indy 500, using machines that they
had already owned from the prior season.

An interesting question is: could the IRL have been viable in 1996 if CART had not
sold any of their old cars to the new IRL teams, and boycotted the event altogether?
Based on the above analysis, there would still have been just enough cars to fill the 33
spots (I do not count the AIS and Harrington entries, which would have struggled to
meet the minimum speed requirement of 220 mph). All that would have been needed
to have some more competitive “bumping” is for several teams to utilize the other ‘93
and ‘94 Indy cars that would have been available and able to reach competitive
speeds. A major storyline, Menard vs. Luyendyk, would still be intact in such a
scenario, and the cash saved from having to purchase newer Reynards may have even
put the IRL teams in a better financial position for the coming year.

Now what if the opposite had happened - that CART teams came to the IRL en masse
- even participating in the first two IRL races to guarantee themselves a spot? Now
that is the stuff of endless speculation and somewhat beyond the scope of this article.
But I will leave with one thought. Luyendyk said in the Hungness yearbook, “The best
combination in Indy car today at 45 inches (boost) would be a Honda in the back end
of the car.” In fact, Treadway was working on a Honda engine deal for 1996, but
Honda ultimately did not want to supply engines for two races on Memorial Day
weekend. Had the U.S. 500 not been run by the CART teams, we might have been
treated to an epic battle between Luyendyk, Menard, Ganassi and the other
Honda/Firestone teams. That would have been a story for the ages!
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank Mike Burrell, who worked at the Indy 500 in 1996, for providing
his firsthand knowledge of the cars and teams and some of the photos in this article.

Thanks also to Jeroen Demmendaal, who provided feedback on a draft of this article
and helped me particularly with some of the words in the introduction.

Other sources include the following:

 Various articles from The Indianapolis Star as archived on newspapers.com

 Trackside notes from the archived Indianapolis 500 web site
 Carl Hungness’s Indianapolis 500 yearbooks
 The Indianapolis Motor Speedway’s official Indy Review yearbooks
 Henri Greuter’s articles, “1996 Indianapolis 500: The 239.260 car,” and
“Mercedosaurus Rex at Indianapolic Park / The Penske-Mercedes PC23-500I”
found at 8W

I have tried to include information from reliable sources. However, I would appreciate
any corrections, additional information or feedback. Please contact me at
skchow03@gmail.com.

About the author

SK has been a fan of Indy car racing since the mid-1990s. In addition to collecting
motorsports related books and magazines, SK enjoys playing and modding the
Papyrus IndyCar Racing 2 game.
Continue To Part 2