1961 Indianapolis 500

1961 Indianapolis 500

The 45th Indianapolis 500 was held at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway on Tuesday, May 30, 1961. For the first time since 1949, the Indianapolis 500 was not recognized on the World Championship calendar. The race celebrated the 50th anniversary of the first Indy 500 in 1911.

Eddie Sachs and A. J. Foyt were battling for 1st-2nd in the latter stages of the race. On Foyt's final scheduled pit stop, his crew is unable to properly engage the fuel mechanism, and his car does not take on a full load of fuel. Foyt returns to the track, and is pulling away from Sachs. Foyt's car is running faster due to the light fuel load, but his crew signals him that he will be unable to make it to the finish without another pit stop. The crew borrowed a fuel tank from Len Sutton's team, and signaled Foyt to the pits.

Foyt gives up the lead on lap 184 for a splash-and-go. That hands the lead to Sachs, who is now leading by 25 seconds. With three laps to go, the warning tread shows through on Sachs' rear tire and Sachs decides to play it safe. Rather than nurse the car around, he pits to replace the worn tire on lap 197. Foyt takes the lead with three laps to go and wins his first (of four) Indy 500 victories by a margin of 8.28 seconds.

Other notable stories include two-time defending World Champion Jack Brabham, who drives the race in a low-slung, rear-engined Cooper-Climax. Dubbed the "British Invasion," it would be the first notable post-war appearance of a rear-engined car, and within five years, the rear-engined revolution would take over the Speedway. The venerable front-engined roadsters are much faster down the long straights, but the superior handling of Brabham's Cooper-Climax in the flat corners keep the car competitive. Brabham drives the car to a respectable 9th place finish.

In October 1961, the mainstrech of the track is paved over in asphalt, and thus the entire track is now paved in asphalt. A single yard of bricks at the start/finish line is left exposed from the original 1909 brick surface. The remainder of the original 3,200,000 bricks now lie underneath the asphalt surface.