Walter Zoomie’s World: 2006 Indy 500 Pictorial - May 22

By Walter Zoomie

Here is a picture I took yesterday.

It is kinda artsy-phartsy. It is a Duesenberg. Dusies were expensive and fast cars back in the old days. Only the coolest people back then, like Clark Gable or Mickey Rooney, could afford them.

Sometimes, when I’m tired of shooting race cars and mechanics with dirty hands, I try to go all Ansel Adams and take something that would look good on a magazine cover or a Pink Floyd album or something.

This picture would have turned out better if I had a camera that was better than my Kodak Instamatic, probably.

If you look closely, you can see many things in this picture. You can see a reflection of the Vigoda. You can see a reflection of a Champ Car friend who is full of hate and rage. You can see a reflection of me.

I hope you all like this photo. That would be a good reflection on me!

Earlier this week they had a buncha old pace cars sitting out on part of the road course.

When I was a kid in Indy, my buds and I always got fired up and excited when we started seeing pace cars cruising around town in late April or early May. We’d say stuff like, “Hey man! You see the new pace car? It’s bad-ass!”

We had filthy mouths back then, I guess.

These are a couple of my favorite pace cars.

This is a 1969 SS, 350 cubic inch Chevy Camaro pace car.

If you had one of these in ‘69 and you couldn’t pick up chicks, it was because you looked like Steve Krisoloff or something, probably. Or maybe you didn’t brush your teeth. My grandma once said, “Steve Krisoloff is unfortunate looking.”

I would never say a mean thing like that.

I didn’t have a 350 cubic inch Chevy Camaro SS pace car in 1969. I was only 7 years old then, and my dad wouldn’t let me drive anything or even get my driver’s license.

He was a smart dad.

This is a 1974 W-30 Hurst Oldsmobile Cutlass.

It had all kindsa Hurst shifting goodies and a massive 455 cubic inch mill. The Olds 455 was a torque monster. Torque is a cool word real gear heads use. It means you can do smokey, frame-twisting, axle-snapping burnouts at red lights! It means you can pull tree stumps outta the ground with it. It means you get a lot of attention from the police!

My dad dropped an Olds 455 into one of his Cadillacs! I drove it to Pizza Hut once. It was awesome, and I didn’t even wrap it around a tree or a bridge abutment. I am a skilled driver. Heck, I bet I’m as good as Martin. That’s what I think!

About Walter Zoomie's World: Walter Zoomie has kindly allowed a number of his entertaining tales of adventure to be published by IndianaRacing.net. You can read more at his official blog: Walter Zoomie's World. Also, be sure to check out the hundreds of fantastic vintage racing photos taken by his father Rick, a former Indianapolis newspaper reporter and photographer.