Mario Andretti: Some of us in this room won’t survive

Mario Andretti opens up about the higher rate of racing fatalities during his prime years and how he walked away from a dangerous Indy crash in which his car flipped at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
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Episode debuted nationwide in 2013.
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[@FloridaManRacer]

Mario will always be one of my biggest heroes in life. Humble, strong, wise and still involved to this day heavily in the sport. He's a true role model and a true inspiration.

[@HighSierraBob]

Well stated!

[@Yosemite-George-61]

Bad loser... complainig all the time, got out driven by all his team mates, won the F-1 championship in a revolutionnary car and after his team mate (Ronnie) died, then he faded. Won Indy by chance, could not post a competitive lap time at Le Mans... Won Daytona, big deal... Go see Foyt... he won Le mans as a rookie after having 10 laps of practice... Indy 4 times, Daytona in NASCAR and Sport prototypes... Mario still bitching about Bobby and about the Fan car...

[@angieburnett4341]

@@Yosemite-George-61 Yeah you're right, Mario's the one who hit Arie Luyendyk in the back of the head & was always blaming everyone else...WRONG!! Why such hate? If you don't like Mario go somewhere else, this is for people who LIKE him. Foyt was a good driver, have to respect that but I had no respect for him as a person--but you still wouldn't catch me on one of his interview sites hating on him. You need Jesus....

[@Yosemite-George-61]

@@angieburnett4341 Mario was a product of the American press that considered Foyt "unsituable" for TV... Mario is a bad loser... and besides, what did he do that's so extraordinary? He won the F-1 championship, in the best car after Ronnie died, then Reutemann proved faster than him the year after. I'll take Foyt, the Unsers, and the NASCAR crowd before I go for Mario...

[@saltybildo9448]

Lotta bad luck at indy, I was there for most of the let downs man

[@joshuabaham1863]

I like football, basketball, soccer etc. but none of those sports will ever require as much balls as racing does

[@RollerCoasterLineProductions]

Especially racing Indy cars from that era

[@derekcrymble9085]

Mr Mario Andretti ........All style , all the time .

[@_aaaaaaaaaa_]

One word: Respect!

[@ccth22]

So true!

[@garymcaleer6112]

I was a kid watching Mario racing for Andy Granatelli in the old STP car. A story I heard but can't confirm was that Mario was driving his Ferrari on a winding road when he came up to obstacle blocking the road and he skillfully spun his car in a 180 and came to a stop.

[@peterpetruzzi]

Triple backflip with a perfect dismount. give this man the gold medal! 10 10 10

[@d.e.b.b5788]

Probably what a lot of drivers think for a split second when they think they're going to die; 'I hope is doesn't hurt so much'.

[@PeterKKraus]

Before the mid 80s, it was crazy in racing. Fuel tanks were horrible. The chassis were not sturdy enough. Gilles Villenuve might have lived if the Ferrari had a carbon fiber capsule like Lotus had. A little bit taller roll bar too.

[@n.w.owhoknowstheshadowknow58]

Yeah he might off Lived if he didn't fly out of the car into a fence seat still attached

[@mrdtla]

…if Ferrari understood carbon fiber construction ( The Perfect Car, biography of John Barnard ). TK

[@Obi-WanKannabis]

It was the transition period of carbon fiber in F1, Lotus and McLaren had it but Ferrari didn't yet. To their credit they had the best car of the season, but at the cost of both drivers. They earned the constructors with blood, but no one was alive/fit to take the driver's.

[@lucozade8373]

Must take a lot of carry on after two of your team mates don't make it

[@Darkwell0071]

Amazing individual.

[@joevald3]

Great driver everybody loves Mario

[@TheArtOfDean]

An incredible flip and crash; I realize these cars are sturdier than ever before, but good grief.

[@timcolledge3732]

Mario Andretti is a great driver and a great man!!!! 👍👍

[@nervo6321]

That was one hell of a crash.....so lucky it landed right way up....would have been another legend lost and Mario is a legend make no mistake.....

[@jujuoliver6959]

I don’t know when this was filmed but he is a good looking 80 or late 70s at the time this was filmed. They don’t seem ancient videos so I am assuming not too long ago.

[@urban.drooid71]

unbelievable what these pro drivers could do. balls of titanium.

[@WildwoodClaire1]

in the 1950s and 60s, the cars had about as much safety built in as the cars of the 1930s, only they were going a LOT faster. The 1953 Indy 500 is infamous because about 1/2 of the drivers who competed eventually lost their lives racing.

[@thejanusproject32]

That's a scary thought. Even scarier that he is saying that in the Drivers meeting that they all knew that some would not last the SEASON. It sounded like a war. Scary

[@DJDouglasWarden]

An absolute legend!!! and one cool dude. ☮️❤️🎵🌍🤗🏁

[@brett3612]

not knowing if i would live tomorrow, god damn thats got to be stress full

[@dpitd]

Legend.

[@pacheco8506]

Three flips and just happened to land on the tires

[@robertlyman2278]

Mario Rocks!!!👍👍

[@NakedUndone]

"I hope it doesn't hurt too much..."

[@mikehatch2114]

I thought he flipped once. That was, like a triple.

[@TheJagjr4450]

When I was a kid there was at least one driver a year in F1 and LeMans Prototype racing a year who was killed.

[@858415]

Legendary man

[@AgungWahyudi90]

RIP Ronnie Petterson, former Andretti's team mate

[@Shoewearer20211]

A legend

[@iron60bitch62]

My commander in 1991 told us the same thing before we went into the first golf war you really can’t take it serious because if you do there’s a number of people who won’t go

[@shannon5373]

Mario Andretti is a Bonafide Legend!!! National Treasure!!! American BADASS!!!

[@TheEgg185]

How does someone rate this thumbs down?

[@yvlakhtionov]

Lucky guy and a great driver

[@raybruce9522]

Mario is just a bad ass what else can ya say ? So is Michael.

[@kingeskimosquiggly396]

Old school live or die but I will go fast attitude

[@georgebuller700]

I've done a 'flat' 360 (engine Seizure) but to do that...........

[@bobjersey]

So Barbra's to blame! I KNEW it!!

[@stevegreen9460]

spinning round like that helps slow the car down, acts like its own wind buffer.

[@motorsportfan1246]

Mario was so lucky that day, if he went into the fence it was over for him. Unfortunately Tony Renna was less fortunate...

[@alexstewart9068]

Mario saved the most spectacular crash for last.

[@saltybildo9448]

Mario, dont tell my wife lol

[@lonewolf2513]

Mario has seen some shit over the years

[@VegasCyclingFreak]

Wow, that was a very gnarly crash

[@irishclown66]

True race car driver , has driven a ton of different race cars ......

[@GrocMax]

F1= Luftwaffe+RAF, IJN/IJA, France, Espaniol, Ital, (and, on occasion, USAAF) still doing battle, still about aero, power, and pilot. And just like WWII, we finally learned the pilots were the bigger part of the picture, after killing off the best of them. All you gotta know about this guy is watch his Daytona win in 67. Loose is fast, right?

[@kennethkilleen8758]

Crazy how a driver can qualify another driver. Silly to take a risk at his age

[@D2Kprime]

A younger driver wouldn't have been in any less danger. Marco could have been driving. Same thing would have happened.

[@millieo7155]

Interesting. I thought the other way, go when you're older than young...less to miss.

[@moonytheloony6516]

It may be silly to you, you didn't make a living as a racing driver...He did, which means him in that car was what he always did. Him being older is irrelevant to that particular crash. Any younger driver would have had the same outcome or worse..

[@ErnieAlgorriernietheattorney]

Who in the hell could downvote this?

[@jeroenroland9322]

you was luck not be killed in incident like Ayrton Senna.

[@TmcIIIvideo]

Is it me or is this Graham Bensinger a wide eyed goofball?

[@pagedown4195]

It´s a shame how Ronnie Peterson was held back just because they needed an american driver to launch Lotus i the USA. Ordered to stay behind Andretti. But faster, and everybody knew it. Why can just not the fastest man win? Hate politics.

[@moonytheloony6516]

Same thing almost happened to Andretti at Daytona in 1967. According to him, during a key pit stop his team was rather...slow...which allowed his teammate, Fred Lorenzen to ride on by and assume the lead in the 500 because in good old Dixie Land, ya can't have a foreign-born American named Mario Andretti winning the Daytona 500 for crissakes....but he raced him down and won it anyway despite his team trying to influence the outcome. Yes, politics, it can be a thing in racing and it's an awful byproduct. Andretti in that Lotus was extremely good in '78. Peterson would have had his hands full trying to beat him for that title regardless. We'll never know. The worst thing is that the F1 world was denied to see Ronnie Peterson compete in 1979 and beyond...in which he likely would have won at least one F1 title and who knows? Maybe he would have competed and won the Indy 500 at some point, but as you know that's F1 in the '70s...it's amazing Andretti lived through that entire decade in the first place.