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Larry Curry: Vision Racing's Team Manager |
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October 10. When Tony George announced the formation of his own
Vision Racing organization back in February he introduced Larry Curry
as the new Team Manager. Larry’s responsibilities would include
both the IndyCar team, with Ed Carpenter being the number one driver,
and the Menards Infiniti Pro team, with Jay Drake as driver.
Also, as part of the Vision Pro Series deal, Larry brought with him
Racing Professionals’ owner/driver, Jon Herb, for whom he was already
the Team Manager.  Larry Curry
Tony had picked in Larry one of the most experienced and talented team
managers in the open wheel business. As a small sampling, Larry
had been the team manager behind both the late Scott Brayton, when he
won the 1996 Indy 500 pole, and Tony Stewart, when he qualified 2nd for
that 500. [Tony had turned in the fastest lap ever in practice at the
IMS on May 6, 237.336 mph.] He was also the Team Manager behind Tony’s
1997 IRL IndyCar Championship.
In 1999 Larry became a co-owner of Tri Star Motorsports, along with
Tony Stewart and Andy Card, with their own car which Tony ran in the
’99 and ’01 Indy 500’s. In ’01 Jon Herb drove four IndyCar races
for Tri Star and Larry.
Last year Curry was the Team Manager for Tony Stewart Motorsports,
handling Tony’s three USAC open wheel programs; midgets, sprints and
Silver Crown. Jay Drake won the National Sprint Championship and
Corey Kruseman finished 3rd. Josh Wise was 2nd in the National
Midget Championship. Not bad!
Nick Bussell joined the Vision Racing Pro team starting with the
Nashville race, following the withdrawal of the J. L. West Motorsports
team.
For the last story in our series on the Vision Racing Pro team we
sat down and talked with Larry in his office to get his insights.
>>Larry can you tell us a bit about your team owner and drivers for the Pro Series?
Of course, I have probably one of the most interesting owners in the
Series, being Tony George. Tony is very committed to not only the
Indianapolis 500, but certainly to the IRL, as well as the Infiniti Pro
series. I think his commitment is long term. I think
his commitment is solid, meaning that he’s going to do whatever it
takes to make the thing work. I’m in a unique position because we
are one of the few teams that runs a car in both series, so I see both
sides of it, meaning the IndyCar side versus the IPS side. And I
think as that [Pro] Series grows it will become an excellent feeder
series.  Tony George
I’ve been in racing more than 30 years. I was a drag racer
first. But my first year at Indianapolis was as a spectator in
1964 as a kid. Last year I ran Tony Stewart’s open wheel program
where we ran midgets, sprints, Silver Crown. We won the Sprint
car championship, finished first and third, we finished second in the
midget championship, and we won a total of, I think, it was 15 races
last year. That was between Jay, Corey Krusman, and Josh Wise.
Corey is probably as good a dirt driver as there is in the
country. And Jay last year won a championship. I personally
believe that Jay is someone that’s been over looked in his
career. I think the guy’s got an incredible amount of talent, and
hopefully throughout the course of this year with the IPS cars he’ll be
able to prove that.
To me that was just a matter of opportunity. In this business,
timing is everything. When Jay came along he didn’t really get a
lot of publicity in what he was doing in sprint cars and things of this
nature. That was when television started going away from these
cars. At the time when Tony Stewart and Jeff Gordon and
Ryan Newman and these guys were going doing sprints that was covered on
TV by Wednesday night or Thursday night Thunder.
Unfortunately, Jay was kind of caught out of that coverage. But
given the opportunity there is no question in my mind he can do it.
>>How did Jay get put together with Vision?
I ran him in one Pro race last year, at Indianapolis. He
qualified fourth. He was the first car that broke the track
record and he finished fourth in the race. So, when I went to work with
Tony George, Tony says, ‘I want to run an IPS car. Who do you
want to put in it?’ And I said Jay Drake!  Jay Drake
>>When did you first become associated with Jay?
When I came and worked for Tony, on his USAC program, that was the
first I’d seen him race, and I was impressed. He’s not only
a good race car driver but a mechanic. And he understands the
car. He does a lot of his own engineering on Tony’s sprint
cars. He knows what he wants.
>>Larry what do you look for in a driver who can work well with you?
You want a guy….. you can tell how interested a guy is by how much he
comes around. For instance when I first ran Tony Stewart in the
IRL car the guy wanted to be there, wanted to hang out with the crew,
asking questions all the time about why you’re doing this to the car,
or whatever. When you get a guy who just kind of…. when we say
we’re going to practice at 9, he just shows up then, and when practice
is over at 6, he just leaves. That’s a bad sign. That is not a
guy that is really committed and says, ‘I want to get all of
this. I want to learn everything I can learn.’ So that’s
the main thing you look for.
>>What about Jon Herb, who we know has a great respect for you?
Jon and I go back, well, I first got involved with Jon in about
2000 or 2001. We ran Jon through a kind of an ROP [Rookie Orientation
Program] program for the IRL. He wanted to run an IRL car. At
that time Tony Stewart and I had a team, Tri Start Motor Sports, so we
agreed to go do a test. And the idea was we were going to run Jon
at Homestead, Atlanta, and Indy; a three race deal. But the IRL,
to get him approved, wanted me to go run him through a rookie test at
Atlanta. So we did. And everyone was telling me, Larry,
what are you doing, you’ll never get him qualified at Indy. He’s
this, he’s that. And some other people had gone down and
ran him a little at Homestead, and he was way off the mark.
But as I learned in my career, you need go evaluate things on your
own. In other words, its not fair to evaluate him on what
somebody else thinks . So we made the deal. We breezed him
through his rookie test in Atlanta. No problems. This was
the oval track the IRL was running on. So we show up at the first
race at Homestead. The first session the guy’s fifth
quickest. That’s a fast track, and at that time it was
flat. And we had not even updated our car for the 2001
season. Some guys had an update kit on and we didn’t even have
one. We get him in the race and we have a motor problem.
Had nothing to do with Jon.  Jon Herb
We go on to Atlanta. He qualifies in the top ten again, and is
running 7th – 8th. That’s when they had the big accident at
Atlanta that year. Jon’s car got hit with some debris, but he did
a great job of missing the accident. So I had to bring him to
Indy for a ROP. Same deal, not an updated car. He breezed
through his deal in 50 laps. Ran over 215. No
problem. OK. So as the month started, we started him off
nice and slow and I just kept giving him a little more race car.
On qualifying day the guy goes out and qualifies at over 223 mph, and
is 18th, and he out qualifies Michael Andretti [21st] and Al Unser Jr
[19th]. And people are shocked. They are looking at me
like…..I said this guy has got some talent. He can do this if he
wants to do this. But the thing I know about him for sure is that he
can run an IRL car. If somebody gives him an opportunity to
do it, he will do it. He has the talent to do it. I have
all the respect in the world for Jon and I know more about him than
anybody. [Jon finished 27th in the 500, and completed 104 laps.]
>>Larry, tell us about team owners.
Well you like to work for a team owner that is a racer; who is
compassionate about racing. Not just a guy that is only a
businessman. For instance, you might have an eccentric guy who is
just thinks racing is cool. But that’s going to wear off in
time. A racer is a racer forever. He wants to go run and
that’s what you look for because they understand the ups and downs. A
racer understands that you go through these times where you’re good,
you’re not so good. You get bad and then it comes back.
For instance, you take a team like Ganassi. Here’s a team that
for three or four years nobody could beat. And now they are kind
of a place 10 team. For their program that isn’t something, because
Chip is first and foremost a racer . He was a race car
driver. He understands it. But he’s committed to the
program. Roger Penske is the same way. I sat on the pole
here with my driver the year Roger missed the show [1995]. Here
is the winningest car owner that’s ever been at Indianapolis and he
goes home. So even they go through that. The good
ones are committed as hell. So that is what you want. For
me, Tony George, I know, his first stint was as a driver and car
owner. His business is racing. So I think he’s pretty committed.
>>We were at the press conference when Tony announced Vison Racing,
and thought that was the best thing for the IRL, the IndyCars and Pros.
As I’ve told people, its real easy if you sit over there operating a
business [the IRL] and you’ve got [team] owners coming in complaining
about the cost of things. What do you believe? But when you are
physically living it and you are seeing it as a team owner yourself…… I
think that the IRL, because of this, will be trying harder to get cost
containment under control I believe that. And what
better way to send a message to sponsors, to the public, and to the
race community that you are committed. He is saying, I’m in here with
you.  Nick Bussell - Photo Credit: Joanna Edwards
>>Now that you’ve worked with Tony for awhile with the Pro as well at the Indy Car team what can you say?
It’s been enjoyable. He knows a lot more than people
realize He asks some pretty good questions. You can
tell he’s got his head set on. He’s in tough, I’ll just say that.
One of the things you have to remember in this deal is you have to keep
where your program is at in perspective. Again, I’ve been up on
the top of the thing and down. And I’ve seen our progress and I know
that you can’t rush it.
But we have to continue to work on the project and I’m more interested
to be in the program where I’m finishing in races right now. And
I don’t want to put the cars or the drivers at risk to try to get to
something that I think is unachievable to us right now, because its
risk versus reward.
>>Switching over to the technical side as Team Manager, how do
you approach car set ups between the Pro cars and the Indy cars?
The Pro series cars are so limited in terms of what you can do.
The wing angles are fixed. You can only raise it up so high. So
then you try to free it up mechanically in different ways. With
the IRL cars we’ve got a few more things to play with, but the process
is similar, because they are both limited on power. You’ve got to
make them drive as good as you can mechanically, and then run them with
the minimum amount of down force and drag you can get by with.
>>Would you say the Pro cars are more driver oriented because the cars are more equal?
In the Pro series you have to have a really, really good race
car. And then, the guy’s got to go drive it, meaning that the
detail on the body fit has to be perfect. You’ve got to do
everything you can to get every ounce of drag off of it.
Everybody has the same motor. So it isn’t like this guys got a
Honda and this guys got a Toyota, or whatever. Everyone has the same
thing. And so you’ve got to have the whole package. You’ve
got to have the car as good a race car as you can get.
You’ve got to pay attention to everything you can within the framework
of the rules to reduce rolling resistance, friction and then the guy’s
got to go drive it. You’ve got to have it free enough to where a
guy…its like a go- kart where he’s not scrubbing anything.
And the driver’s got to be a finesse guy. He’s got to go out and
figure out that maybe he turns in late and makes the straight away
longer or whatever. All of those things.
>>You’re saying with an Indy car you’ve got other things you can take advantage of?
With an Indy car I can play around with taking a lot of drag off.
For instance, whatever angle I want on my Pro Series car is the same
wing angle Sam Schmidt has to run. He can’t run less wing than
me. But in Indy cars, maybe you’ve got a Dan Wheldon who can run
with his rear wing at negative four and some other driver can’t drive
it that free. Well, negative 4 to negative 2 can be 2mph.
But because of his ability, you know, Dan can drive a car that’s
freer. You don’t have that in the Pro series.
fromthetrack.com would like to close our series on the
Vision Racing Pro team by looking at how Larry and his Pro drivers have
done so far this season, with only one race left:
Jay Drake: 12 races, three 2nd row starts, four 3rd row starts,
two podium finishes [3rd at Indy and Nashville], five top 5
finishes. Points standings – 9th.
Jon Herb: 13 races, one 1st row start, four 2nd row starts,
one 3rd row start, two podium finishes [1st at Phoenix and 3rd at
Homestead], led three races [Phoenix, Indy, Chicago], four top 5
finishes. Points standings – 7th.
Nick Bussell: 7 races for Vision, one 2nd row start, two
3rd row starts, three podium finishes [2nd at Pikes Peak, 3rd at
Milwaukee and Chicago], led Chicago race, six top 5 finishes.
[One 1st , two 2nd and one 3rd row start, one podium ( 3rd at St.
Pete), and four more top 5’s with West]. Points standings – 4th.
Not bad for a first year team. Just wait till 2006!
[Our interview with Larry Curry was before Nick Bussell joined Vision Racing.]
For our earlier stories on the Vision Racing Pro team see: May
25, “An Interview with Tony George,” March 31, “Jon Herb: Pro
Series Points Leader,” May 25, “Jon Herb: Pro Team Owner-Driver,” July
1, “Jay Drake: Pro Series Iron Man,” and August 9, “Bussell Races Up
Pro Learning Curve-Parts 1 & 2.” |
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