ABC Long Form Broadcast of 1973 Indy 500

[MS]

I was a baby for this race and as a former broadcaster and a lover of history I find these clips very interesting to see how the network covered the race.

Here's a clip of the Savage crash. Since McKay and Economaki were doing voice over work and this wasn't the live call they knew Savage had survived. It is interesting to hear them talk hopefully about Savage's chances as the fire breaks out. We also hear audio (thankfully not footage) of the Teran crash. I admit, it may be a little tough to watch.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lO4z3GbgY3k

I my opinion, David Dials, the pit reporter, was rather irresponsible in trying to goad Jerry Grant into saying that the track was too oily and dangerous to race.

During the red flag period, Dials tries to continue with the "track is too oily and dangerous to drive" line. We also see an interesting piece on safety at IMS - interesting to see all of these "new" safety features that are old hat today.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EByX7...feature=relmfu

Finally the finish.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ui-Jm...feature=relmfu

I find it amazing to hear Dials with such a tone deaf interview with Andy Granatelli. Granatelli saw a crew man get killed and had one of his drivers fighting for his life but Dials is doing such a cheery interview. As Chris Schenkel wraps up the race you can tell the entire broadcast crew is emotionally and physically spent.

I don't mean to put down the late Mr. Dials, but it appears that he was out of his element in the pits that day. The next year they put Chris Economaki - an experienced auto racing journalist - in the pits and had Sam Posey and Jackie Stewart in the booth with McKay.

What a year...........

I'm so glad Gordy won one of the "best" Indy 500s in 1982 after winning one of the "worst."

[Pelican Joe]

Interesting stuff. I agree that Dials sounds a little out of his element...but considering the emotionally charged circumstances of that race...I guess I can cut him some slack. 1973 is one I'm glad I missed (It was roughly 3-and-a-half years before I was born...so I guess I didn't have a choice)...but I'm glad it's been preserved via the television broadcasts that exist.

[MS]

Also, during the red flag segment, Bobby Unser said the track wasn't dangerous! Uncle Bobby...........

[DaveL]

I watched the race recently on Youtube and was facsnated. It was just a couple of years before my time.

At the end Jim Mckay is practically begging for a red flag to end the race once and for all.

I watched it shortly after I watched the coverage of the race from St. Pete. ABC's coverage has improved very little in 40 years.

[MichaelP]

What I find impressive about the broadcast is that the race ended only an hour before the tape delayed broadcast aired that night! That didn't give them much time to put the broadcast together.

A couple other observations:

When the fireman gets to the Savage accident, there are only small flames around the car. He sprays the extinguisher at a pool of fuel on the track which goes up in massive flames as soon as the extinguisher foam hits it!

I was always under the impression that Savage crashed on an outlap after pitting - but there is no mention of him pitting and in fact, going through my records (both video and print) I can find no record of him pitting the lap before the accident. Can anyone confirm one way or another?

Supposedly a 30 second segment was edited out of the rebroadcast - it supposedly involves Chris Economaki commenting on what a disaster the race is turning out to be. This clip would have supposedly been right after the Teran accident.

Jerry Grant was visibly more unnerved in his second interview after the Savage accident than he was in his interview from Monday following Walther's accident.

The weather was beautiful when the race re-started.

Can't figure out for the life of me why they didn't throw the checkered flag at the end - it was nearly 6pm and it was so dark the cameras were barely working - there was no way they could possibly dry the track.

Dolly Cole - who was in the pace car and was only the second female 'honorary referee' of the 500 (Amelia Earhart was the first), still attends the race every year - she can usually be found hanging with Jim Nabors. My mom has actually befriended her in recent years. (Dolly had been married to Ed Cole who ran GM in the 60s).

You can hear the crowd cheer when Gordy is declared the winner.

After watching this broadcast with 39 years of hindsight, it would be easy to scorn any cheering or celebration that took place. But don’t forget, the participants, fans and crews didn’t have the replays and newspaper articles thrown in their face for review and reflection while the race was going on. Many did not know that a crewman was killed, and Swede Savage’s injuries were not life threatening; the news of his passing would not come for another 33 days. Sometimes the nature of how bad or good something really was doesn’t hit immediately. I think that as fans and participants had time to reflect on the events, read the newspapers, and watch the replays, is when it really sank in just how much the 1973 Indianapolis 500 sucked. For Johncock, it may have even been that night. He ‘celebrated’ by visiting Swede in the hospital and having dinner at Burger King with his wife.

[DaveL]

I was always under the impression that Savage crashed on an outlap after pitting - but there is no mention of him pitting and in fact, going through my records (both video and print) I can find no record of him pitting the lap before the accident. Can anyone confirm one way or another?

Savage had pitted 3-5 laps before the accident so it was not an out lap. Never the less, the car was still full of fuel.

[Doctorindy]

Supposedly a 30 second segment was edited out of the rebroadcast - it supposedly involves Chris Economaki commenting on what a disaster the race is turning out to be. This clip would have supposedly been right after the Teran accident.
.

Yes, I have that clip somewhere. It's a shot of the ambulance pulled up next to the Teran scene, and Chris E. says "this race is cursed."

There's actually a foreign highlight film on Youtube now that has the image of the incident happening. It is what it is. There's a lso a NEW 8 mm film of the Salt Walther crash. Much better quality, and a slightly different view. It's actually pretty good.


As for the broadcast, I think sort of what they did in the tape delay years when they didn't have a lot of time....The guys would be in the truck putting pieces together, and Jim McKay et. al. would call the race 'live' while it was being aired at 8 pm.

I've also heard several different versions of the hamburger story after the race. Recently I heard it wasn't Burger King, but actually Burger Chef. Gordy himself has actually told the story wrong I think a few times. Maybe he just doesn't totally remember himself anymore.

[dalz]

When the fireman gets to the Savage accident, there are only small flames around the car. He sprays the extinguisher at a pool of fuel on the track which goes up in massive flames as soon as the extinguisher foam hits it!

I think that the whole area was engulfed in invisible methanol flames, and the extinguishant just makes it visible. I've seen the same phenomena in some pit fires.

I was always under the impression that Savage crashed on an outlap after pitting - but there is no mention of him pitting and in fact, going through my records (both video and print) I can find no record of him pitting the lap before the accident. Can anyone confirm one way or another?

I believe it was three laps after his pit stop. It has to be rather soon, to account for that geyser of methanol thrown in the air as he hits the wall. If I'm following the coverage correctly, that's Al pitting up ahead of him as he comes out of four, and Swede is about to take the lead again. He definitely was a contender that day.

Supposedly a 30 second segment was edited out of the rebroadcast - it supposedly involves Chris Economaki commenting on what a disaster the race is turning out to be. This clip would have supposedly been right after the Teran accident.

There are some here who have commented that there is another view of this crash that was edited out of this recent re-broadcast. Something in the back of my mind recalls a slightly wider, more far-away shot, where you can see a crewman (not Teran) running across pit lane and almost getting hit by Al as he is pitting.

[Big G 94]

Sid Collins and Freddie Agabashian on the radio were pretty much of that mindset too ... I thought Sid was going to pop a champagne cork when they got to 100 laps and it was an official race.

At the end Jim Mckay is practically begging for a red flag to end the race once and for all.

[lotuspoweredbyford]

Sid Collins and Freddie Agabashian on the radio were pretty much of that mindset too ... I thought Sid was going to pop a champagne cork when they got to 100 laps and it was an official race.

No doubt. Sid is like, this is the most disastrous race ever. You could tell he was done with it all.

[Big G 94]

Also, during the red flag segment, Bobby Unser said the track wasn't dangerous! Uncle Bobby...........

Well, anyone expecting Uncle Bobby to be filled with emotion at such a moment probably was barking up the wrong tree. He was about as matter of fact after Sachs-MacDonald which he was right in the middle of. I have him tabbed pretty much as a "Somebody bought it? That's bad, but (expletive deleted) happens in racing, scrape 'em up and throw the green flag" type. But has it ever been determined beyond a shadow of a doubt whether the biggest factor in Swede's crash was oil on the track or something breaking on the car? I'd always heard the wing came loose. When that happens at that speed, odds are you're going to crash on the cleanest of clean tracks.

[Pelican Joe]

Well, anyone expecting Uncle Bobby to be filled with emotion at such a moment probably was barking up the wrong tree. He was about as matter of fact after Sachs-MacDonald which he was right in the middle of. I have him tabbed pretty much as a "Somebody bought it? That's bad, but (expletive deleted) happens in racing, scrape 'em up and throw the green flag" type. But has it ever been determined beyond a shadow of a doubt whether the biggest factor in Swede's crash was oil on the track or something breaking on the car? I'd always heard the wing came loose. When that happens at that speed, odds are you're going to crash on the cleanest of clean tracks.

My mom and dad ran into Swede in the lobby of the motel the day before the race. To this day...my mom still talks about how friendly he was. I've heard the story about the rear-wing failure...but I don't know if that has ever been proven. I've always been under the belief that he was pushing hard and just lost it...but who knows. He's one of those drivers we can only speculate about. Would he have become a star? Quite possibly...but alas...we'll never know.

[preacher]

Concerning Swede's rear wing, it is pretty clear in the ABC broadcast that the wing separates from the rest of the body when his car hits the transition between the track and the infield right before the inside wall. At least the announcers say so. It is much more difficult to tell if the wing is separating from the rest of the body before he hits the transition point. My own amateur hunch is that I rather doubt it.

[Big G 94]

Interesting stuff. I agree that Dials sounds a little out of his element.

The only thing I clearly remember Dave Dials doing for ABC is their college football scoreboard show. I figure they needed a body to work the pits and said "tag, you're it." If things had been uneventful, it probably wouldn't have been a big deal. I may get stoned for this, because it's going to sound like I'm knocking the IMS Radio Network when I'm on record as saying what it did in its glory days under Sid was unparalleled in sports broadcasting, but IMO the one real weakness it had was the pit and Victory Lane interviews in general, because while those guys were outstanding broadcasters, they didn't have the inside, technical knowledge of racing that people expect from coverage today. (The 1966 Victory Lane interview with Hill comes to mind as being particularly painful).

However, because those guys were outstanding broadcasters, true pros and veterans at the speedway, and they realized something eventful and horrible and out of the norm had happened, their interviews during the Sachs-MacDonald red flag in '64 were absolutely masterful, because at least to my ears they switched into news event mode at least until the race started back. And what they did during the '66 red flag wasn't too far behind.

As you say, Dials was simply out of his element and flailing around, particularly in the Granatelli post-race interview. Which was a bit surprising because I just Googled and he had a hard news background, worked for the AP, before getting into sports broadcasting. Maybe it was because he was so affected by what happened, I don't know. Because having been there, you've got to keep your head straight and find out what happened, you don't let it affect you until the job's done.