MOORESVILLE, N.C. – Mario Andretti remembers Al Unser as a great teammate and an even better friend.
From 1972 to ’75, Andretti and Unser were teammates on the Vel’s Parnelli Jones Super Team. Andretti left the team after the 1975 season to go Formula 1 racing full-time while racing in select Indy car races for team owner Roger Penske from 1976 to ’80 and in ’81 with Pat Patrick.
Andretti returned to Indy car racing full-time in 1982 through the ’94 season.
Unser drove for Vel’s Parnelli from 1969 through the ’77 season. He drove for Jim Hall’s Chaparral Racing from 1978 to ’79, Bobby Hillin from 1980 to ’81 and joined Penske Racing in 1982.
“I got along with Al absolutely brilliantly,” Andretti told SPEED SPORT. “We got along as well as you could as teammates. Al could drive anything as beautiful as anybody if it was set up properly. I learned from him so from that aspect, it was a ‘win, win’ situation that was as good as could be as teammates.
“There isn’t a negative thing that I could say about driving with him as a teammate not only in IndyCar but also Formula 5000 and the dirt cars. We had a ball in those dirt cars. We didn’t give an inch and then laughed it out later after the race.
“I loved that. I love those moments.”
Unser passed away on Dec. 9 after fighting a 17-year battle with a rare form of cancer. He was 82. Andretti turns 82 on Feb. 28 and remains as vibrant as ever.
“Al reached millions and millions of people throughout his career, and they aren’t forgetting him, either” Andretti said. “You can never prepare for when they are gone.
“Every time, it’s a new situation that you have to deal with, but it never gets easier. The only thing you have is to look back and remember all the wonderful times we had together. When I think of Al, I think of us dueling in a dirt car, dueling in a Formula 5000 car and dueling in an Indy car and trying to make the dihedral wing car work in 1972.
“Not all of it was peaches and roses, but we all made it through it. We had our issues, we had our laughs, we cried together. The families spent time off the track together. I think between the Unser family and the Andretti family, it was one big family.
“When you lose one on that side, we lose one of our own.”
Andretti remembers Unser as a “quiet tiger” while his older brother, Bobby, “growled.”
“Al was the smoothest driver I ever followed, whether it was on a superspeedway or a short oval, especially on dirt,” Andretti said. “I would be behind him trying to get by him and I would be all over the place and Al was just smooth as silk.
“There was always something to learn from him.”
Andretti drove more like Bobby Unser. Both were hard chargers and tried to lead every lap. Al Unser’s style was more like Rick Mears – smooth, steady and conserve the race car for the shootout at the end.
“Al also had that virtue of patience, but he was always ready to attack,” Andretti continued. “He just waited. It was a natural feel that he had for it. I call it intelligent race craft, but there was no way to know that the person he was following would drop out of the race.
“He cashed in when I dropped out in 1987. But he was there to collect as the first one to benefit. He had that feel to be patient with the car and it paid off for him over and over.”
It was the 1987 Indianapolis 500 that Andretti started on the pole and ran away from the field, leading by as much as two laps before his engine quit on lap 180 after leading 170 laps.
The lead went to Roberto Guerrero, but when he stalled twice on pit lane during his final pit stop, Unser was able to make up a near two-lap deficit to take the lead.
He went on to become just the second four-time winner in Indianapolis 500 history. Ironically, Unser did not have a ride at the start of the Month of May in 1987. He got a call from team owner Roger Penske after one of his drivers, Danny Ongais, was injured in a crash and was unable to compete in the race.
“Al may have been in a year-old show car, but Al was out there with first-class equipment,” Andretti said. “Roger Penske doesn’t put anything on the track that isn’t first class.
“It was still destiny. When you look at the team Roger had that day with Danny Sullivan and Rick Mears, you probably didn’t think Al Unser would be the guy to win. But he did.
“If I couldn’t win it; Al winning was fine with me. I always liked Al in every respect. To reach that milestone, how sweet it is. He was not at the pinnacle of his career, but to land something like that and capitalize, it was ‘Atta boy.’”
Bobby Unser’s personality was out front and extraverted. Al Unser’s personality was more introverted but had a sneaky sense of humor.
“He was more calculated,” Andretti recalled. “He would let everybody get flustered, then put his own digs in there. He was not an attention seeker like Bobby.
“Bobby wanted to control the conversation and Al was just the opposite.”
Both Bobby and Al, however, were persona non grata with rental car companies. Legend has it they both had lifetime bans for the destruction of several rental cars.
“We’re not going to talk about that,” Andretti said with a laugh.
They also loved tossing ‘Cherry Bombs’ in motel room toilet so they could watch huge chunks of porcelain explode.
Andretti laughed when he recalled those stories.
“They exploded a Cherry Bomb in Don Branson,” Andretti recalled. “Don didn’t think it was that funny.
“Poor Old Don.
“They were always up to something. The stupid things we used to do, I don’t know why, but we had to outdo each other with crazy stuff.”
On the track, Andretti is the only driver to win the Indianapolis 500 (1969), the Daytona 500 (1967) and the Formula 1 World Championship (1978). He won 52 Indy car races and four Indy car National Championships.
Al Unser is one of four drivers to win the Indianapolis 500 four times, won 39 Indy car races and three Indy car National Championships and was a two-time Pikes Peak Int’l Hill Climb winner.
Ironically, Al Unser and Andretti are connected in a very unique way.
The last race Al Unser entered was the 1994 Indianapolis 500 for Arizona Racing, a team co-owned by Jeff Sinden and Joe Kennedy. Al Unser could not get the car up to speed and announced his retirement from racing during the first week of practice.
Andretti continues to drive the IndyCar Two-Seater – a team that is owned by Sinden and Kennedy.
“Oh, My Goodness, I never knew that” Andretti said when told that fact. “How about that?
“I’ll be darned. You learn something every day.”
The Andrettis and the Unsers also share a unique sense of pride in each other’s families. Before Al Unser died, he was the driving force of the Unser Family Racing Museum to honor his family’s accomplishments in racing.
“Look at what they accomplished collectively,” Andretti said. “The same with my family and my kids. When they accomplish something like that, there is nothing better to do it than do it as a family. The Unsers did that in so many ways.
“We are full racing families, flat-out and that is why we identify with each other so much.
“Just great memories. We had some great moments.”