Izod IndyCar Series 2011 Historical Record Book

[Don Capps]

Although I was made aware of the Izod IndyCar Series 2011 Historical Record Book by Steve Shunck and Tim Sullivan last year, I never saw a copy and promptly forgot about it. However, several days ago a copy in PDF was made available to me.

I can appreciate the effort and the motivation behind the book. That is laid out at the beginning of the book:

This book is the official reference for North American Indy car racing statistics dating to 1946, including the sanctioning bodies of AAA, USAC, CART/Champ Car and the Indy Racing League/INDYCAR.

A nice idea to say the least. However, the devil is always in the details and, alas, Shunck & Sullivan offset the good that they do with making information available regarding the various championship series in a single work with dropping the ball when it comes to the Usual Suspects: continuing to perpetuate the Arthur Means/ Val Haresnape/ Russ Catlin/ Bob Russo School of Revisionist History.

The use of the word "official" certainly makes the historian in me take great exception with what I found in the book.

While on page six Shunck & Sullivan do attempt to lay out some of messy details of how the School of Revisionist History came to be -- as well repeat some of those notes later on, they then proceed to treat the events from these ersatz championships as actual championship events by incorporating them into the combined listing of "championship" victories.

Wrong.

Then there is this regarding the 1920 championship:

Note: AAA had two different listings for the 1920 season. At the start of the year, 11 races were listed as counting toward the championship, but at the end of the season, AAA determined the championship to be based on the results of five races giving Gaston Chevrolet the championship. These results were considered official by AAA from 1920-26 and 1929-51. The 11-race championship was first recognized in 1926 with Tommy Milton as champion and was considered official for 1927 and from 1952 to 1955, the final year that AAA sanctioned auto racing. The races marked with the asterisk (*) did not count in the 1920 championship until the 1926 calculations were made.

This notion is taken from an article written by Bob Russo -- obviously based upon information from Russ Catlin -- that set out to "prove" that Tommy Milton was the "real" 1920 National Champion. John Glenn Printz has proved that Russo was wrong in virtually every aspect of his concocted story. Yet, here it is in the "official" IICS historical record book. As we know from bitter experience, few seem to pay attention to the footnotes or any explanations otherwise this whole mess would have died ages ago.

It was also interesting to note the absence of anything regarding the Championship Racing League of 1980. A quibble, perhaps, but given that USAC imploded after the Mid-Ohio round in the joint championship, at least worth a mention.

I fail to see the point of combining the various separate, distinct championships and treating them as if they were all of the same bolt of cloth, but I do see the value of bringing the various parts together in a single volume.

As usual, history loses once again.

[Don Capps]

As it turns out, this effort was a diktat from on high by Randy Bernard:

The other one is what we’re doing with our history books. When you talk about all open-wheel drivers – legends and current – the fact that we are going to roll all the statistics up and combine them, so IndyCar statistics will go back for a hundred years, is something I know they appreciate. I think IndyCar fans—CART, IRL, AAA; you name it—will appreciate that too. We have statisticians putting it together right now. They’re combining them as we speak. By the time the new season gets here, you should see a new combined set of IndyCar statistics in our media guide. I think it’s important.

I think if someone breaks one of AJ Foyt’s records, that's huge news. And it’s not being disrespectful to [the legends]… they want it too, they want to see their records recognized for being so great, which they are. And I think that we try to hide that. It was open-wheel racing before the IRL was created, by God, and we need to make sure we go back to that and we combine everything and make sure we honor those legends that have been such a big important part of our history. And if someone breaks one of those records, it’s a huge, huge accomplishment. I think the real open-wheel purist is going to love that. This is long overdue, in my book.

This is not too far from the sort of nonsense that Bob Russo got some at CART to buy into when he pulled the rug out from under John Glenn Printz and Ken McMaken in the mid-80's.

Not much changes: historians and history seem to usually be on the losing end of these sorts of efforts.

"Pity the poor historian!" -- Denis Jenkinson.

[Don Capps]

Don, you could try giving Randy a call and volunteering to help work on the project. Maybe bring some sense to it?

It would have to be after I return from Afghanistan. Then again, it seems very clear that he got exactly what he asked for....