Catchfence

I can remember sitting at a friends watching TV when a special report came on that Mark Donohue had died. I remember crying in front of the few friends I was with, and they had no clue what had just happened when hearing that news. It, for me, was like a bad dream, it couldn’t have really happened.

Mark Donohue, the first IROC champion (won three of the four races) a two-time SCCA Trans-Am Series champion, a Grand American Rolex 24 Hours at Daytona champion and an Indianapolis 500 winner (to name just a few accomplishments) had just passed away (August 19, 1975) from a cerebral hemorrhage from injuries sustained in an accident during practice for the Formula 1 Austrian Grand Prix at Österreichring.

Mark and I had seen each other at Road Atlanta the year before during the run offs, we had a broken car that was giving us fits, Mark had invited me to dinner and I had to decline. I remember vividly him driving away giving me his famous “Marks salute”. Those who knew him know exactly what that is.

For me, life was never the same. What will I do if I had a question that only Mark could answer? As Hazel, Marks niece would say, “’WWMD’ What Would Mark Do.” It still comes up today with projects and ideas, Mark always did it the right way or so it always seemed.

Mark never ever realized what he meant to so many people. I remember him being at Road America in the Lola T332 AMC, a “shit box” in his words. He had finished in 8th, and people surrounded him like he had won the race. He never understood why would anyone cared when he was not the winner.

Mark always made you feel like you were the only one he was speaking to when you spoke to him. He genuinely cared and listened intently when you knew he had a million other things on his mind associated with the car he was driving, and dealing with the team.

Everyone thought with Mark’s engineering skills and Roger’s (Penske) money he could do anything. The truth was, Mark was one great driver, with or without Roger. He knew with a proper car and his engineering skills, he could more than make up with what he thought was lack of driving skills. He just never knew how good he was.

In NASCAR, even today and 38-years later after the victory, you still  hear his name mentioned as being the only road course specialist/ringer to win an event in the modern era (the 1973 2.62 mile Winston West 500 at Riverside International Raceway) which also gave Roger Penske his first NASCAR victory (a year after giving Penske his first Indy 500 IndyCar victory).

He always had an “Unfair Advantage,” and the day he won at Riverside they had Porsche 917 brakes in the Matador. One of the biggest issues was brakes at a road race,  and most of the drivers just ran out of brakes before the end. With the 917 brakes he was turning laps faster at the end than at the start. That was his “Unfair Advantage” that day.

The most amazing part for me is how he affected so many people, and I wonder how many kids were named after him from the Dads who watched him when they were kids. I am one of those people and as my son Mark, now as an adult knows what an amazing guy he was. All of the Penske guys who worked with Mark all have a special story and a special memory.

For anyone who would like to read more about Mark, renown auto racing author and photo journalist, Michael Argetsinger, has a couple of books I would highly recommend reading. They are called Mark Donohue, Technical Excellence at Speed, and Mark Donohue, His Life in Photography. Both books can be purchased through BullPublishing.com