Who was the first to use an aerodynamic wing on a race car? We wouldn’t attempt to tackle that one,  but we can name one of the early adopters: Smokey Yunick at Indy in 1962.

In auto racing, the use of inverted wings to provide aerodynamic downforce did not happen in a single stroke. As usual, it took a series of shaky first steps as both racers and racing organizations pushed back against the game-changing development. We can recognize a few of the pioneers, however.

There was German-Swiss engineer Michael May, who fitted a wing atop the cockpit of his Porsche 550 Spyder at the Nürburgring in May of 1956. There was American oval track racer Jim Cushman, who ran a giant wing on his super modified at Columbus, Ohio Speedway in 1958. And there was Bob Osiecki’s Mad Dog IV closed-circuit record racer at Daytona in 1961. There were others, surely. Meanwhile, in 1962 at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, arguably the greatest stage in the world of racing, the first to try a wing was, naturally enough, Smokey Yunick.

As always, the best place to start on all matters Yunick is with Smokey himself, in his priceless autobiography, Best Damn Garage in Town (one of the most greatest racing books ever written—check out our review here.)  According to Smokey and others, the wing experiment at Indy in May of 1962 was conducted with the former Ken-Paul Special, the Watson-Offy roadster that won the Indy 500 in 1960 with driver Jim Rathmann. Yunick and Kenny Rich, his sponsor, drinking buddy, and partner in Ecuadorian gold mining adventures, continued to campaign the Watson at Indy in ’61 and ’62 with backing from the Rich family business, Simoniz car wax products.

As related by Smokey, the wing was conceived and constructed by Bruce Crower, famed San Diego camshaft manufacturer and a frequent member of Yunick’s pit crew at Indy, with the aid of some friends at Consolidated Aircraft. From this photo detail above, we can see that the wing was well-constructed with a robust mounting system—unlike some wing pioneers, they clearly recognized the potential forces at work. Meanwhile, driver Jim Rathmann doesn’t appear to be very thrilled with the new hardware, and the spectators along the fence on pit road seem baffled.

We can also see that the wing, a seat-of-the-pants design without any of the advanced tools racers have today, featured generous camber and a fat chord ratio. With the benefit of pure hindsight, we can say this wing design was more suitable for a sprint car traveling half the speed than for a 150-mph Indy car. The wing worked, all right—it worked all too well.

With the grip-producing downforce the wing generated, the corner speeds in practice were an astounding 146 mph. But due to all the resulting aero drag, the speed on the straights was around 146 mph as well. The winged Watson droned around the track at full throttle and a constant 146 mph, give or take. The speed was barely fast enough to make the show, and Smokey feared the throbbing Offy four-banger could not take the strain for 500 miles. At that point the experiment was abandoned, and the formal introduction of wings at the speedway would have to wait a few more years. (However, Crower constructed another wing of more appropriate dimensions for drag racer Don Garlits and it was a success, winning the 1963 NHRA Winternationals.)

With the wing removed, Rathmann qualified the well-traveled Watson-Offy at 146.610 mph, good enough for 23rd starting position, and he managed a ninth-place finish on race day as the team struggled with brake problems (or clutch—the driver and crew chief couldn’t agree which). Smokey remained permanently bitter about Rathmann’s performance that May, convinced that the 1960 winner, now 34, married, and the owner of a new car dealership, was just cruising around, and that he wasn’t very helpful with the wing testing, either.

After the wing experiment in May of 1962, the former Ken-Paul Special moved on to new owners and exploits, but the winged version of the roadster is still with us today—in a way. In 2001, Carousel 1 produced a beautiful diecast model in 1:18 scale, below. We’re total strangers to the world of diecast, but apparently the model can be displayed both with and without the controversial wing. It’s said the original production run sold out in a few weeks, but examples can still be found for sale on eBay and elsewhere.                  –Photos above by Indianapolis Motor Speedway.