Fred Levon Agabashian (August 21, 1913 – October 13, 1989) was an American racer of
midget cars
Midget cars, also Speedcars in Australia, is a class of racing cars. The cars are very small, with a very high power-to-weight ratio, and typically use four-cylinder engines. They originated in the United States in the 1930s and are raced on most ...
and
Indy cars
American open-wheel car racing, generally and commonly known as Indy car racing, is a category of professional automobile racing in the United States. As of 2025 IndyCar Series, 2025, the top-level American open-wheel racing championship is sa ...
.
Career
Midget car racing
Agabashian competed in his first midget car race in his teens. His first championship was the 1937 Northern California Racing Association against such drivers as
Jack London
John Griffith London (; January 12, 1876 – November 22, 1916), better known as Jack London, was an American novelist, journalist and activist. A pioneer of commercial fiction and American magazines, he was one of the first American authors t ...
. He won the 1947 and 1948 BCRA championships for
George Bignotti
George Adolph Bignotti (January 12, 1916 – September 27, 2013) was an American motor racing mechanic and team owner who was active in American open-wheel car racing from the 1950s through the 1980s. Bignotti was one of the most successful chief ...
.
Championship racing
Agabashian qualified for his first
Indianapolis 500
The Indianapolis 500, formally known as the Indianapolis 500-Mile Race, and commonly shortened to Indy 500, is an annual automobile race held at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in Speedway, Indiana, United States, an enclave suburb of Indian ...
in 1947 and finished 9th. He made the next 11 500s with a best finish of 4th in 1953, the extremely hot race day where he was relieved by
Paul Russo
Paul Frank Russo (April 10, 1914 – February 13, 1976) was an American racing driver.
Racing career
Midget car career
Russo started racing midget cars in 1934. He went with a contingent of midget-car drivers to Hawaii in the winter of 1 ...
. He qualified on the pole in 1952 in the Cummins Diesel Special, the first turbocharged Indy race car, but it dropped out after 71 laps.
Agabashian won one Championship race, a 100-mile contest at the Fairgrounds in
Sacramento, CA
Sacramento ( or ; ; ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the U.S. state of California and the county seat, seat of Sacramento County, California, Sacramento County. Located at the confluence of the Sacramento Rive ...
in 1949.
He retired from the sport after failing to qualify at Indianapolis in 1958.
Broadcaster
After his retirement, Agabashian did
color commentary
A color commentator or expert commentator is a sports commentator who assists the main (play-by-play) commentator, typically by filling in when play is not in progress. The person may also be referred to as a summariser (outside North America) ...
for the
Indianapolis Motor Speedway Radio Network
The Indianapolis Motor Speedway Radio Network (known typically as the IMS Radio Network or the INDYCAR Radio Network), is an in-house radio syndication arrangement which broadcasts the Indianapolis 500, the NTT IndyCar Series, and Indy NXT to ra ...
, serving from 1959 to 1965 and again from 1973 to 1977.
Death
He died on 13 October 1989 at
Alamo, California
Alamo ( Spanish: ''Álamo''; meaning " Poplar tree") is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) in Contra Costa County, California, in the United States. It is a suburb located in the San Francisco Bay Area's East Bay r ...
and was cremated.Resting Places: The Burial Sites of More than 14000 Famous Persons, Scott Wilson
Recognition
Agabashian was inducted in the
National Midget Auto Racing Hall of Fame
The National Midget Auto Racing Hall of Fame is an American Hall of Fame and museum for midget cars. The Hall of Fame is located at Angell Park Speedway in Sun Prairie, Wisconsin, and can be accessed during weekly Sunday races during the summe ...