FLRacingFan
Team Owner
Legendary IndyCar team owner and icon Carl Haas died last week at the age of 86. RIP.
http://www.indycar.com/News/2016/07/07-07-Carl-Haas-obit
http://www.indycar.com/News/2016/07/07-07-Carl-Haas-obit
Carl Haas
- Thread starter FLRacingFan
- Start date
From an article by Jim Donnelly, on the Hemmings Daily web site:
Legendary Indy team founder Carl Haas dies
Jim Donnelly on Jul 8th, 2016
Carl Haas, a Chicago businessman who formed one of the most fearsome Indy car combinations in history, has died following a long illness, the website RACER.com and other sources have reported. He was 86. Although his death was not announced until yesterday, Haas passed away June 29 and was known to have been suffering from Alzheimer’s disease.
Haas gained most of his celebrity from teaming up with the late Paul Newman to found Newman-Haas Racing in 1983, when Newman’s own career as a driver was just blossoming. Many rank Haas high among the people who nurtured Newman from an actor who dabbled in racing to a racer who sometimes acted. Yet for years, his team was one of the powerhouses in CART, employing drivers including Mario Andretti (who finished his fabled career with Newman-Haas), Michael Andretti and Nigel Mansell, with Haas creating a global spectacle by snatching Mansell away from Formula 1 while he was its reigning world champion. Over the years, Newman-Haas notched 16 major championships and more than 140 individual race victories, but Carl Haas also ran programs in Formula 1 (though not the current Haas F1, owned by Gene Haas), NASCAR, Formula 5000 and the Can-Am series.
Though his greatest notoriety came as a team owner, Haas was a racer in his own right, having started in 1952 and scored one of the first wins at Road America in Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin, after it first opened. During the 1960s, Lola founder Eric Broadley made Haas the distributor for his race cars in the United States. Later, so did Hewland gearboxes. Dealing with his customers was said to have given Haas a faultless eye for future driving talent – including Newman.
A cigar-chewing legend in the CART paddock, Haas also promoted races at the historic Milwaukee Mile for a decade and also put on the Houston Grand Prix for several years. The Haas family has said that memorial contributions can be made to the Alzheimer’s Association at 8430 W. Bryn Mawr, Suite 800, Chicago, IL 60631 (847-933-2413) or The Hole in the Wall Gang Camp at HoleInTheWallGang.org.
Legendary Indy team founder Carl Haas dies
Jim Donnelly on Jul 8th, 2016
Carl Haas, a Chicago businessman who formed one of the most fearsome Indy car combinations in history, has died following a long illness, the website RACER.com and other sources have reported. He was 86. Although his death was not announced until yesterday, Haas passed away June 29 and was known to have been suffering from Alzheimer’s disease.
Haas gained most of his celebrity from teaming up with the late Paul Newman to found Newman-Haas Racing in 1983, when Newman’s own career as a driver was just blossoming. Many rank Haas high among the people who nurtured Newman from an actor who dabbled in racing to a racer who sometimes acted. Yet for years, his team was one of the powerhouses in CART, employing drivers including Mario Andretti (who finished his fabled career with Newman-Haas), Michael Andretti and Nigel Mansell, with Haas creating a global spectacle by snatching Mansell away from Formula 1 while he was its reigning world champion. Over the years, Newman-Haas notched 16 major championships and more than 140 individual race victories, but Carl Haas also ran programs in Formula 1 (though not the current Haas F1, owned by Gene Haas), NASCAR, Formula 5000 and the Can-Am series.
Though his greatest notoriety came as a team owner, Haas was a racer in his own right, having started in 1952 and scored one of the first wins at Road America in Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin, after it first opened. During the 1960s, Lola founder Eric Broadley made Haas the distributor for his race cars in the United States. Later, so did Hewland gearboxes. Dealing with his customers was said to have given Haas a faultless eye for future driving talent – including Newman.
A cigar-chewing legend in the CART paddock, Haas also promoted races at the historic Milwaukee Mile for a decade and also put on the Houston Grand Prix for several years. The Haas family has said that memorial contributions can be made to the Alzheimer’s Association at 8430 W. Bryn Mawr, Suite 800, Chicago, IL 60631 (847-933-2413) or The Hole in the Wall Gang Camp at HoleInTheWallGang.org.
