At 84, A.J. Foyt said he would rather be at the Daytona 500 than at another memorial service for a departed friend. He’s done a lot of that in the last year, having attended memorial services for many of his contemporaries, including Dan Gurney, Indianapolis Motor Speedway owner Mari Hulman George and, most recently, Glen Wood of the Wood Brothers, who died at the age of 93 on Janu. 18.
“Hell, it’s nice to be back instead of the funeral home,” Foyt said. “I’ve been pretty sick the last few years. I’ve been able to get healed up and get back here. I’ve got a lot of friends back here. I really enjoyed racing, especially here at Daytona. It’s always been a love for me here.
“I wasn’t supposed to live over 22, and here I’m 84, so that’s getting pretty damn old.”
Foyt could not hear some of the questions that were asked of him Sunday morning before the Daytona 500.
“I hate wearing hearing aids because when you go to take a leak, it sounds like 100 gallons of water in your ear,” Foyt said. “That’s why I don’t wear them.”
Foyt remains cantankerous and often humorous. But this was a day when Foyt remembered the late Glen Wood.
It was the 1972 Daytona when Foyt drove the famed Wood Brothers No. 21 Mercury to the most dominant victory in Daytona 500 history. He blew away the field and won the race by one full lap over Charlie Glotzbach. Third and fourth place were Jim Vandiver and Benny Parsons — and they were six laps behind Foyt’s winning car.
“I had everybody covered,” Foyt said. “It was a runaway. I knew I had it won when they dropped the green flag. I knew I had a fast car and would have great pit stops if I stayed out of trouble.”
Foyt’s 1972 Daytona 500 victory made him the only driver to win the Indianapolis 500, the 24 Hours of Le Mans and the Daytona 500 in his career. Foyt had previously won three Indy 500s — 1961, 1964 and 1967. He went on to become the first four-time winner of the Indianapolis 500 in 1977.
Foyt co-drove with Gurney to win the 1976 24 Hours of Le Mans.
Foyt had already won two races at Daytona International Speedway in his career prior to that Daytona 500 victory. He drove a Ray Nichels Dodge to victory in the 1964 Firecracker 400 a little more than one month after winning the 1964 Indianapolis 500. He came back the following year and won the 1965 Firecracker 400 for the Wood Brothers.
Glen Wood was the patriarch of the Wood Brothers Racing team along with his younger brother Leonard. Both are in the NASCAR Hall of Fame.
Between the NASCAR races on the old beach course and the Daytona 500 that began in 1959, Glen Wood had been coming to the races at Daytona Beach every year from 1947 until last year.
Sunday’s 61st Daytona 500 was the first time in 72 years that Glenn was missing from SpeedWeeks.
“I couldn’t have drove for better people than the Wood Brothers,” Foyt said. “They were the first ones down here that started the fast pit stops. The Ford Motor Company brought them to Indianapolis to do the pit stops for Jimmy Clark in 1965, and he easily won the Indy 500. There are a lot of things that the Wood Brothers started that everybody caught up with.
“What I really remember about Glen Wood, when I was driving for him, I don’t care if it was Daytona, Atlanta or California, if I got a little bit behind, he would stand on pit wall and motion me to ‘pick it up a little bit, AJ.’ We didn’t have radios back then.”
There was another race Foyt recalled at the old Ontario Motor Speedway in California.
“I was leading the Ontario 500 for them and had a very bad vibration in the car,” Foyt recalled. “I must have had a tire or something out of balance and told them I had to make a pit stop because it was shaking.
“He said, ‘A.J., this race pays $150 a lap in lap money.’ I said, ‘The vibration went away.’ We went on and won the race.
“You couldn’t have had nicer people than Glenn and Leonard. We’ve become very close and I’m still real close to them. I’ve had a lot of good friends through the years. Most of them are dead and I’m still here. I don’t know whether that’s good or bad.”
Foyt won seven NASCAR Cup races in his career to go along with his IndyCar record 67 wins and seven IndyCar championships.
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