Monday, May 22, 2006 | 7:20 a.m.
Indianapolis 500 stirs memories of tragedy
The last time I tried to change the oil in my car I wound up looking like Prince William Sound after the Exxon Valdez struck that reef. I am not what you would call a "gearhead." And yet nothing revs my motor like the Indianapolis 500, which will be run - if it ever stops raining - for the 90th time Sunday.
I owe part of that to my Hoosier upbringing. I owe the other part to a guy named Sid Collins.
Before I started going to the race, I listened to it on the radio. Sid Collins was the voice of the Indy 500. The sound of hamburgers sizzling on the grill and his familiar voice provided the soundtrack for Memorial Day at our house.
Sid Collins was the guy who called the Indy 500 "The Greatest Spectacle in Racing." He helped make it so. Whether it was A.J. Foyt weaving through a last-lap crash to take the checkered flag or Bud Tinglestad qualifying on the outside of the 10th row, Collins made whatever happened during the month of May at the venerable Brickyard sound larger than life.
In 1991, when UNLV was trying to defend its NCAA basketball championship at the Hoosier Dome, I escorted a handful of Rebels fans out to the Speedway, and I remember their jaws dropping when they saw how big the place was. It was an experience I never had because Sid Collins had prepared me for it.
He was at his best when tragedy struck, which in those days, was way too often. One of my earliest memories of the 500 was Collins' off-the-cuff eulogy for Eddie Sachs, a popular driver who was killed in a fiery crash just after the start of the 1964 race.
A lot has changed since then, including the significance of the race during the NASCAR era. But as the gentlemen (and one lady) get ready to start their engines, Collins' words still ring profound, appropriate, and, in a strange sort of way, comforting:
"Racers are courageous men who try to conquer life and death. They know the risks and they calculate every risk they take. They take it as a part of living. A race driver mentally leaves this earth when he straps himself into the cockpit to try for the biggest conquest he can make. Eddie Sachs played those odds.
If a racer succeeds, he is a hero. If he fails, he tried. It was Eddie's way to try with everything he had, and he always did.
The only healthy way we can approach a tragedy of the death of a friend such as Eddie Sachs is to face life as he did. To face it as it happened - not as we wish it would have happened.
We're all speeding toward death at the rate of 60 minutes every hour. The only difference is we don't know how to speed faster, as Eddie Sachs did. Since death has a thousand or more doors, Eddie Sachs exits this earth in a racecar. Knowing Eddie, I assume that's the way he would have wanted it."
According to Collins' obituary, he received more than 30,000 letters requesting copies of that poignant tribute.
Mine is hanging in my office, right above the die-cast model of Eddie Sachs' racecar.
THIS WEEK'S BEST BET
Mountain West Conference baseball tournament, Tuesday-Saturday, Wilson Stadium
San Diego State coach Tony Gwynn presides over another aluminum bat symposium at UNLV.
TICKETS: 739-FANS or www.unlvtickets.com
ON THE WEB: http://themwc.cstv.com/
ALSO WORTH A LOOK
WWE Raw, 5:30 p.m. Monday, Thomas & Mack Center
If you think Barry Bonds' head is large, just wait until you see these guys' biceps.
TICKETS: 739-FANS or www.unlvtickets.com
ON THE WEB: www.wwe.com
archive
