That is awesome. What a great historical find. When is the coffee-table book being published.

There should be more race cars now called "special."

Is that the cummins whose engine was thrown into a river, or the cummins that was bricked up in a hidden room in the back of a warehouse?

And Audi thought they were inventing something new with the diesel R10...

pshaw!

why don't irl name their race cars anymore? oh yeah. because they're all the same cars. time for yet another boring indy.

Ooh! More of this type stuff, please. that was such a good era looks-wise.

maybe it's because i live 30' from the motor speedway but this really isn't anything special. you can walk into the speedway photo shop and buy any of these photos.

[www.indianapolismotorspeedway.com]

I'd have to call my car "Phallus in Wonderland" or something along those lines. Cool pics

Fantastic! I love how each of the cars is very different from the next. Even the wheels go from full metal through a few different spoked designs.

My day has been made, and I haven't even gotten to the ballpark for the mid-70s-and-sunny day game yet.

@skyln95: Considering that about 75% of the cars at the time were Kurtis Kraft chassis and nearly everyone had an Offy engine, I'd say an identical grid is nothing new.

@EuropaBambaataa: 75% is still more acceptable than 100%.

Awesome.

@joshman: The Ferrari pictured dropped out of the race early due to wheel failure.

Gorgeous, gorgeous cars.

That Cummins is hugenormous, I can't imagine they'd allow such a size disparity between cars anymore.

You can find 25 ways to die with one glance at those monsters. And what fine monsters they are!

omg where are teh seatbelts?

Brilliant! I only wish I was around to see just one of the roadster era Indy races. These machines were truly "special". Thanks for sharing this slice of American racing history.

I love these old roadsters. Engine in front, driver in back, just like God intended.

A look at wikipedia says the Cummins Diesel was the first entry of a turbocharged car in the Indy 500.

This just made my day. If only someone culd find a full length onboard camera film from 52.

Novi- drool.....

Very true about the interesting variety,tho- there were some very interesting experiments at this '52 race, and in fact, all throughout the 50's and 60's.... Now it's Honda spec car racing, yawn.... Not that Nascar is any better, tho.....

@SundaySundayFnC: Indy roadsters were featured at Laguna Seca last year. To hear one run much less see a bunch under power is fantastic! They weren't run hard and they weren't meant to turn right but still very, very cool.

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