Henry “Smokey” Yunick, one of motorsport’s great innovators and most colorful personalities, recently passed away from leukemia.
Starting in the ’50s, Yunick built a reputation as an original innovator and a master of developing horsepower. Yunick’s many achievements as a mechanic and a racecar preparer include winning the Indianapolis 500 with Jim Rathman in 1961, Daytona 500 victories in 1961 and 1962, two NASCAR Grand National Championships, as well as a lengthy list of patents and inventions.
Yunick is probably best remembered for his uncanny ability to engineer his cars in and around a sanctioning body’s rulebook. Some of the examples of his ingenuity include the construction of a 7/8th scale Chevelle stock car, which ushered in the era of the NASCAR body template and a “side-car” for the Indianapolis 500, where the driver sat in a separate sidepod from the engine in order to achieve better distribution of weight to the inside tires.
Of the many stories that describe Smokey’s inventiveness and sense of humor, none is better than the time NASCAR officials conducted a teardown of one of Smokey’s stock cars. Feeling certain his car had been carrying too much fuel, NASCAR officials removed the gas tank out of his car for inspection. After asking if they were done, Smokey then got in the car and drove it back to his garage – without a gas tank!!
