Sport
Chase Austin – African-American driver to compete at Indy 500
“I have some friends from the Kansas area who were watching Austin coming up and winning everything at the local tracks,” Larry Foyt said. “Then back in February, I told Dad, ‘Hey, you need to watch this kid.’”
Miles is encouraged by the future of minorities in racing and believes Austin will be a success in one of America’s iconic car races.
“We’ve had that privilege of having Chase represent us extremely well,” he said. “I just knew that Chase was the guy.”
The arrangement between Foyt Racing and Austin, announced by A.J. Foyt during qualifying for this weekend’s IndyCar race at Mid-Ohio, is most likely limited to the Indianapolis 500. All sides deflected questions about other races and tests.
If he qualifies for the Indianapolis 500 next May, Austin would follow in the footsteps of Willy T. Ribbs, the first African-American driver at Indy in 1991, and George Mack in 2002.
Austin said he did not feel the weight of others’ expectations.
“No, because I really thought to myself, ‘What’s the worst that can happen?’ If I don’t make the race, that’s something that happens to a lot of people. But I have the opportunity to race for A.J. Foyt at Indianapolis. That’s what I’m really going to concentrate on.”
Copyright 2012 The Associated Press.
