In this week's Dragster Insider, friends and fellow racers remember the guy nicknamed On the Gas.. Virtually all that is known of Ongais is a matter of public record. He was a motorcycle champion in Hawaii when he decided to come to the mainland United States and go racing. Drag racing, that's been my life, but for Danny, it was just part of where he wanted to go, and he sure got there.. His best years at Indianapolis Motor Speedway came with Interscope Racing and its eye-catching No. Went to victory lane and did all the smiling and pictures. Remembering Dan Wheldon and his last and most amazing win. The team also has been aggressive outside racing. 2021 IndyCar title is just the start for Ganassi's newest star, Why Grosjean's oval commitment shows he's serious about IndyCar, Why Grosjean's title bid is serious He was fast. We let him drive my car, and his first run was as good as any I ever made. Al was doing his typical thing. Ongais later attempted to race at the Marlboro 500 at Michigan International Speedway, the Nissan Indy Challenge at Tamiami Park, and the Bosch Spark Plug Grand Prix at Nazareth Speedway. 162.144.88.63 He had a 7th at Ontario and 5th at Phoenix and then he won his first Indy car race at Michigan International Speedway. But no one could deny his talent. I had probably the best race other than the one I had with AJ Foyt in 1974, but Danny and I were racing at Michigan in 1978, Rutherford told NBC Sports. I mean, listen I've done well in drag racing, and I've driven Top Fuel and Funny Car, but so had Danny, but he even went two or three steps further, driving an Indy car and hauling ass and in IMSA cars. People are hungry and people feel like were out here to do damage.. HONOLULU (KHON2) Danny Ongais, the only Hawaiian driver to compete in the Indy 500, died on Saturday, Feb. 26, in California at the age of 79. He was later discharged and returned to Hawaii for motor racing. He was 79. He had previously been inducted into the International Drag Racing Hall of Fame in 1992. ''He has a good brain,'' says a friend, ''and in a social circumstance can be witty. We may earn money from the links on this page. 2023 Ghanafuo.com & DM Network. A good guy to have a conversation with. Good grief, who can forget Jim Crawford (1990)? Long before Danny On the Gas Ongais became a household name across the country and around the world on television and radio as a revered IndyCar driver, he belonged to us, to the world of drag racing, where he sated his need for speed in the formative years of his motorsports career. Danny Ongais, the Hawaiian driver admired by fans and competitors for his speed and bravery in an Indianapolis 500 career spanning three decades, died Feb. 26 of congestive heart complications in Anaheim Hills, California. Because its so easy to get sucked into a more corporate environment. He suffered a concussion, compound fractures in both legs, a broken arm and a 6-inch tear in his diaphragm. RIP Danny Ongais, who passed away Feb.26, 2022, in California of congestive heart failure at age 79. (Menard recalled how he knew the driver he called The Ghost from the Coast in an NBCSports.com interview last year. This remarkable achievement came one year after the 1981 race where he broke his right leg so badly that a piece of bone shot out of his firesuit and was found a day later stuck in the dirt outside of the track wall. His total assets include stocks, houses, and luxury things like personal luxury boats and planes. In the 1960s he won multiple drag racing championships and was named one of the National Hot Rod Associations Top 50 Drivers for 1951-2000. He finished runner-up in the Top Fuel class at the 1966 NHRA U.S. Nationals after beating legend Don Prudhomme in the semifinals at Indianapolis Raceway Park, and three years later he clinched the Funny Car class win in the same event. Scott said more than 50 percent of applications are trending from outside the United States, which has helped the team to hire from Canada, Australia and England (including Chris Stafford, who left a position as the lead mechanic for the Williams F1 team). He also won eight poles in qualifying. He qualified well over the season, earning three poles, and he finished 12th in the standings. Ongais next drove in CART during the 1983 CART/PPG World Series season, first appearing at the 1983 Indianapolis 500. The action you just performed triggered the security solution. Pole sitter Scott Brayton suffered fatal injuries in a post-qualifying practice crash, and team owner John Menard hired Ongais as the replacement driver. I think its a more family friendly way to go racing. I always wanted to be like him. Racing director Gavin Ward, who oversees day-to-day operations as the direct report to McLaren Racing CEO Zak Brown, started last July after working as head engineer for Josef Newgarden at Team Penske. Im new to this role; hes lived it before. So we just have to keep that, and well be all right.. He was a good guy. Gundlach, who recently was announced as a finalist for Indys Best and Brightest, previously worked cars that won two championships with Scott Dixon at Ganassi. In the late 1950s, Ongais enlisted in the United States Army as a paratrooper stationed in Europe. Danny Ongais (May 21, 1942 February 26, 2022) was an American racing driver. Right from the get-go for me, that was a high-priority item to try and spruce ourselves up. The arduous task took nearly two minutes but was met with rousing cheers from the crowd. In order to keep delivering our expert journalism, our website uses advertising. It would be almost 10 years before he would finally come to Indianapolis. We have no more Information about his Father; we will try to collect information and update soon. After a 9-year hiatus from racing, Ongais was asked by John Menard to fill in for Scott Brayton who was killed during Friday Practice for the 1996 Indianapolis 500. ''He says he doesn`t want to talk,'' said Penske, after making a personal plea to Ongais to grant an interview. That is what I liked about individuals like that.. That attitude often got him in trouble, though. How much does an F1 car weigh in 2023 and what's included in the limit? He really wanted to be here. About three laps to go, Danny ran out of fuel, and he dropped out and that was it. He may yet get that chance. Since the outset of the Russian Troop’s invasion of Ukraine, Valery has run a blog in which he details how Kherson lives and volunteered. It takes some investment.. The Flyin`. Copyright 1996-2023, NHRA. Ongais win at Riverside was especially memorable as his dragster broke after final-round opponent Gordon Collett red-lighted, so, as was the rule back then, Ongais had to push his car the length of the quarter-mile to trip the win light. No information regarding his funeral ceremony has come out yet from the side of his family. INDIANAPOLIS Wedged into a corner of the Penske garage one day earlier this week, sat Danny Ongais, eating an orange, wrapped in his own private world. But we are trying hard to collect all the information about him and will update you soon. Ongais died Feb. 26, 2022 from congestive heart failure in Anaheim Hills, California. Getting Zak more plugged into the team has been a fantastic side effect of this change, Ward said. He was one of the most passionate racers who has overtaken many races in such a manner, which made him immortal in the uncounted hearts. But the fact that he could finish only eighth in the championship attests to the cars poor finishing record. Danny faced a ton of heart problems in his old age. At the end of the celebration, I turned around and looked back toward the garage area and walking toward victory lane was Danny. Burial site and Find a Grave details, Ricou Browning funeral, burial service, pictures, date, time, venue. Regular readers have seen some interesting debates between me and my perennial fan/foil Robert Nielsen, debating the merits of this, that, and the other. The car was disallowed and Interscope brought out their Parnelli 6C-Cosworth DFX. The rest of the year he raced only sports cars.[2]. Ongais scored a best finish of 5th place at the Escort Warning Radars 200 at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course. The Flying Hawaiin led a very secretive life outside the racing world its known that Ongais had a wife but it is said h had a son who is unidentified for now. Al Unser was named as Ongais replacement and drove to his fourth 500 victory in a backup car that was a show car earlier in May in a hotel in Reading, Pennsylvania. Service in the U.S. Army in the early 1960s had exposed Ongais to sportscar racing in Europe, and he eventually switched his focus from dragstrips to ovals and road courses in the mid-70s. The time zone changes arent quite so big. document.getElementById("ak_js_1").setAttribute("value",(new Date()).getTime()), Skip Bayless Wife Ernestine Sclafani Wiki, Biography, Age, Spouse, Net Worth, Fast Facts. WebDanny Ongais, a well-known veteran of the Indianapolis 500, has not spilled any information regarding his partner. RIP Danny Ongais pic.twitter.com/AqJW32Ko2o, Arie Luyendyk (@ArieLuyendyk) March 1, 2022. Please include what you were doing when this page came up and the Cloudflare Ray ID found at the bottom of this page. The tragic circumstances of an accident also led to Ongais final start at Indianapolis, in 1996. For the 1987 season Interscope Racing teamed up with Team Penske getting Ongais in the #25 Panavision Penske PC-16-Ilmor-Chevrolet Indy V8 for the Indianapolis 500, however Ongais crashed in practice and suffered a concussion. I do think he was one of the best drivers out there. He and renowned innovator Mickey Thompson set nearly 300 national and international speed records on the Bonneville Salt Flats in a Mach 1 Mustang during the 1960s. How Harvey found his dream team A head-on shunt in the 1981 Indy 500 left him recuperating for the remainder of the season while four years later at Michigan he went into a barrel-roll after launching off the back of another car. Ongais dominated in SCCA competition in 1974, catching the eye of media mogul Ted Field, who had recently founded the Interscope Records label. Our leadership team was just looking for the best, Scott, who also worked at Stanley Black & Decker, told NBC Sports. We obviously have the resources to tap into and the shared knowledge of the greater McLaren Racing group. Visitation from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m.; Wake service at 7 p.m. Visitation from 9 a.m. to 10:30 a.m.; Celebration of Mass at 10:30 a.m. Burial at East Hawaii Veterans Cemetery No. During a recent episode of his Off Track podcast, Rossi noted the Thermal test hit some snags as the IndyCar team learned to communicate with McLarens software systems in England. There also is an appeal to being a professional sports team. WebFormer Indy car, drag racing star Danny Ongais dies aged 79 Danny Ongais, a race-winner and ace qualifier in Indy car racing whose career spanned three decades died last That was the same year that Ongais became an Indy car winner. In his heyday he was the Larry Mahan of racing. Every so often, a guy comes along, somebody that really catches your attention, that impresses you, and, for me, he was that guy, Prudhomme said. Born in Kahului, Hawaii on May 21, 1942, Ongais remains the first driver from the Aloha State to race in the Indianapolis 500, and hes an appropriate pioneer as May is Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. After losing Saturdays AA/Dragster class final to Thompson, he beat Thompson in the final of the eliminator on Sunday, 8.39 to 8.53, to claim the big prize, then a few months later, he won the Hot Rod Magazine Championships at Riverside Raceway. Even with a short 10-year stint in drag racing, Ongais was still so well regarded that he was voted No. He proved it again in that race and got the job done.. WebDaniel Ongais passed away on October 11, 2019. WebOngais made a comeback in 1996, finishing seventh in the Indy 500 driving for John Menard in the car that young Scott Brayton had been tragically killed in during qualifying. A motorcycle champion in Hawaii when he decided to come to the cars poor record... 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