Vel's Parnelli Jones Racing
Vel 's Parnelli Jones Racing was an American racing team of the 1970s - 1980s.
Vel 's Parnelli Jones Racing was founded in 1969 by the U.S. racing driver Parnelli Jones and his business partner Velco " Vel " Miletich founded. A year later there was the first major victory for the team. Al Unser won the 500-mile race at Indianapolis and the USAC championship in Parnelli - 70 - Colt Ford. A year later, our repeated success in Indianapolis Colt 71 and Joe Leonard won the championship.
From 1972 Parnelli built their own chassis and the same year had to be in Indianapolis the two Parnelli pilots, Al Unser and Joe Leonard only beaten in the McLaren M16 Mark Donohue. Leonard won at the end of the year, but the championship again for Parnelli.
1974 matured the plan to F1 to enter. Jones hired the Lotus designer Maurice Philippe and with a lot of sponsor money from Firestone dared the team in late 1974 to step up to Formula 1 as the driver was Mario Andretti committed to the Parnelli VPJ4 first brought the Grand Prix of Canada at the start and the race as seventh ended. Despite the surprising retreat from Firestone after only two races, the team decided in 1975 to contest the full season with the VPJ4. The biggest success was the fourth place in the Grand Prix of Sweden in 1975 where Andretti even set the fastest lap in the race. As Parnelli in 1976 after three races ran out of money, the team moved back from Formula 1 and Andretti moved to Lotus.
Parnelli returned to the USAC series and developed nor 1976, a turbocharged version of the Cosworth V8 engine. This engine, which was first used in the Parnelli single-seater racing car of Al Unser and Danny Ongais, was the basis for the Cosworth DFX engine, which powered the respective winning car at the 500-mile race at Indianapolis from 1978 to 1987.
Parnelli race cars ran until the 1980s in the USAC series. AJ Foyt was in the 1979 Parnelli VPJ6 in Indianapolis second behind Rick Mears at Penske PC6. Foyt also celebrated the final victory for Parnelli when he won in 1979 with the VPJ6 at Texas World Speedway.
Literature and sources
- Rick Popely, L. Spencer Riggs: Indianapolis 500 Chronicle. Publications International Ltd.. , Lincolnwood IL 1998, ISBN 0-7853-2798-3.