Everyone’s Buddy Now Lazier Looks Beyond Pressure As He Prepares To Seek A Repeat Victory

Buddy Lazier emerged from the trackside conference room at Indianapolis Motor Speedway after an interview session and began to walk toward Gasoline Alley. As he strolled hand-in-hand with his fiancee, Kara Flynn, a slightly tipsy fan standing behind a barricade recognized the defending Indy 500 champion.

“BUUHHDDDDEEEEE!” the fan bellowed, raising his beer in a toast.

A startled Lazier did a double take and acknowledged the fan with a smile and a quick wave. It was just part of the territory. Win the Indy 500 and, suddenly, you become everyone’s Buddy.

“People recognize him a lot more now,” Flynn said of the 29-year-old Lazier, a 1990 graduate of Curry College in Milton (Ind.). “It’s helped his career more than anything. There’s been a lot of pressure on him to repeat - a lot of pressure - but he’s still the same guy.”

When he took a sloppy swig from an ice-cold bottle of milk - the traditional nectar of triumph at Indy - it was one of the first of many spoils Buddy Lazier earned for winning the Indy 500. Lazier achieved his glittering milestone victory by risking total paralysis and overcoming 500 miles of excruciating back pain from severe spinal injuries he suffered in a crash at Phoenix two months before.

What has been the biggest perk as reigning Indy 500 champ?

“Well, now that I’ve won the Indy 500, my fiancee’s actually going to marry me,” Lazier said with a smile. “But this just justifies the years of this mad passion that my family and I have had (with racing). It justifies spending the seven or eight years in 2- or 3-year-old race cars, struggling to get the most out of those cars. Then, when we got a good car, we got the most out of that. It hasn’t changed our outlook on life at all, but it has helped a lot of things on a career basis.”

Lazier’s wedding day is set for Aug. 30.

But Sunday will mark another significant date in his life and career when he attempts to duplicate his feat and deliver car owner Ron Hemelgarn a second consecutive Indy 500 victory. When asked if he knew the last repeat winner, Lazier, who will start 10th in the 35-car field, pointed to Hemelgarn teammate Johnny Unser, seated at the end of the dais.

“I think it was one of his uncles … Al, I think it was,” Lazier answered correctly, referring to Al Unser’s victories in 1970 and 1971. “But I can go one step further and tell you that there’s only been one driver to win this race from the 10th position. It was in 1934. And his name was Cummings.”

Right again, Bud. Cummings, Bill Cummings.

After a whirlwind year of meetings, interviews and autograph sessions with sponsors, media and fans, Lazier appears unfazed by the unexpected fan adulation at the Brickyard.

“Compared to last year, it’s totally different,” Flynn said. “It’s been like night and day. And we didn’t expect it until we showed up. It’s like we couldn’t even get out of the garage. We didn’t expect this at all. I don’t think anyone knows what it’s like or what to expect until it happens. It’s been fun, but I can see where he’s been getting a lot of pressure to repeat - from himself and from some other people. Right now, he just needs to relax.”

Lazier didn’t have much time for that during Carburetion Day Thursday, the final tuneup session before the race.

Nor has it helped that Lazier has been hampered by the flu or that he has had to ponder a tempting offer from the Newman-Haas team to run in today’s CART-sanctioned Motorola 300 at Gateway Speedway near St. Louis, or that he qualified 10th fastest despite little practice time in a car that underwent an engine transplant from a Nissan Infiniti to an Oldsmobile Aurora on the morning of pole qualifications.

“When you come back (as a former winner), you feel like you know what you need to have to win,” Lazier said. “It toys with you when you don’t feel like you have it. But you have to take the pressure off yourself.”

Lazier did that, to some degree, when he sat down with CART owner Carl Haas and Hemelgarn and decided that, as tempting as it would have been to run in the Motorola 300 and Indy 500 on consecutive days, it would not have been fair to his car owner or sponsor, Delta Faucets.

“I think it would’ve been nice for the fans to see that, and that’s why I really was thinking about it,” Lazier said. “But Ron and Delta Faucets had made an awesome commitment to me. When I sat down with Carl and with Ron, they were perfect gentlemen about it.”

For the moment, it seemed there had been a truce between the feuding Indy Racing League and CART sanctioning bodies.

“To see Carl Haas want Buddy says they’re watching this series very, very closely,” Hemelgarn said, regarding concerns about CART raiding IRL talent. “So, I wasn’t mad because I also know the situation with Buddy and how close we work together and how closely he works with the crew. He’s flattered by it also that he was being considered. He’s now being recognized as a world-class driver.”

“That sort of goes back to what’s always been told to me. And that’s the Indianapolis Motor Speedway makes names and it makes drivers and I think it proved again that it does. As for myself? Winning this race sure took me from just an ordinary team to the top of the heap. Buddy’s recognized as a champion and I’m very respectful for the decision he made.”

For Lazier, however, Indy wasn’t about improving his name recognition. It was about those things that is part of every driver’s makeup.

“I always drove race cars, not to be a race driver, but because I loved driving them,” he said.

“I mean, it’s just a blast. That’s the reason I drive and that’s why I race. If you can possibly have a race car that’s capable of winning and a crew, then it really makes it worthwhile. But it was never for all the attention. My goodness, it’s incredible what happens when you come back here as champion.”

MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: THE BUDDY SYSTEM Driver Buddy Lazier’s record in the Indianapolis 500:

Year Finish What happened 1989 Didn’t compete Crashed in qualifying 1990 Didn’t compete Bumped in qualifying 1991 33rd Crashed first lap 1992 14th Engine failed on 139th lap 1993 Didn’t compete Spun out in qualifying 1994 Didn’t compete Failed to qualify 1995 27th Fuel system failure on 45th lap 1996 1st Took lead for good on 193rd lap