Johnny Unser (born October 22, 1958) is a former race car driver. He is the son of open wheel driver

Jerry Unser Jr. Jeremy Michael Unser Jr. (November 15, 1932 – May 17, 1959) was an American racecar driver. He was the 1957 United States Automobile Club, USAC USAC Stock Car, Stock Car champion. Jerry was the first of the Unser family to compete at Indian ...

, cousin of Al Unser Jr. and Robby Unser, nephew of

Al Unser Alfred Unser (May 29, 1939 – December 9, 2021) was an American automobile racing driver, the younger brother of fellow racing drivers Jerry and Bobby Unser, and father of Al Unser Jr. He was the second of four men ( A. J. Foyt, himself, Ric ...

and

Bobby Unser Robert William Unser (February 20, 1934 – May 2, 2021) was an American automobile racer. At his induction into the Motorsports Hall of Fame of America in 1994, he had the fourth most IndyCar Series wins at 35 (behind his brother Al, A. J. ...

, and first cousin once removed of Alfred Unser. Unser's father, Jerry, died in a racing accident when Unser was seven months old. He made 5 starts in

CART A cart or dray (Australia and New Zealand) is a vehicle designed for transport, using two wheels and normally pulled by one or a pair of draught animals. A handcart is pulled or pushed by one or more people. It is different from the flatbed tr ...

in 1993 and 1994 with a best result of 15th. He joined the

Indy Racing League The IndyCar Series, currently known as the NTT IndyCar Series under sponsor (commercial), sponsorship, is the highest class of regional North American American open-wheel car racing, open-wheel single-seater formula racing cars in the United S ...

in its inaugural

1996 File:1996 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: A bomb explodes at Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta, set off by a radical anti-abortionist; The center fuel tank explodes on TWA Flight 800, causing the plane to crash and killing everyone on b ...

season but had a transmission failure during the pace lap of what would've been his first

Indianapolis 500 The Indianapolis 500, formally known as the Indianapolis 500-Mile Race, and commonly called the Indy 500, is an annual automobile race held at Indianapolis Motor Speedway (IMS) in Speedway, Indiana, United States, an enclave suburb of India ...

and was not credited with completing any laps. In

1997 File:1997 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The movie set of ''Titanic'', the highest-grossing movie in history at the time; ''Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone'', is published; Comet Hale-Bopp passes by Earth and becomes one of ...

he made his first start in the Indy 500 starting in the 35th position after League and Speedway owner

Tony George Anton Hulman "Tony" George (born December 30, 1959) is the former Chairman, President, and CEO of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and Hulman & Company, serving from 1989 to 2009. He was also formerly on the Board of Directors of both entities. ...

added his and Lyn St. James' car to the field because slower cars than theirs were guaranteed starting positions because of prior races. He went on to finish 18th, his best "500" result in 5 starts. Unser drove the majority of his IRL races for Hemelgarn Racing and in his 14 career IRL starts he had a best finish of 9th in his very first series start in 1996 at

Phoenix International Raceway Phoenix Raceway is a 1-mile, low-banked tri-oval race track located in Avondale, Arizona, near Phoenix. The motorsport track opened in 1964 and currently hosts two NASCAR race weekends annually including the final championship race since 2020. ...

. His last major open wheel race was the

2000 File:2000 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Protests against Bush v. Gore after the 2000 United States presidential election; Heads of state meet for the Millennium Summit; The International Space Station in its infant form as seen from ...

Indy 500. On January 14 2008 Johnny Unser was named as the race director for the 2008

Champ Car Atlantic Championship The Atlantic Championship is a formula race car series with races throughout North America. It has been called Champ Car Atlantics (after its former name), Toyota Atlantics (due to the series' previous history of using Toyota-powered engines) ...

.Johnny Unser named Atlantic Race Director
TSN.ca, January 14, 2008 He is currently a driver coach and adviser to the Mazda Road to Indy and racing adviser and spokesman for Cooper Tire. He is an official for

Indycar INDYCAR, LLC, is an American-based auto racing sanctioning body for Indy car racing and other disciplines of open wheel car racing. The organization sanctions five racing series: the premier IndyCar Series with its centerpiece the Indianapo ...

in Race Control and is also the owner of Unser Racing, Karting and Entertainment track in Denver, Colorado.

Racing record

American Open Wheel

( key)

CART

IndyCar

Indianapolis 500 results

24 Hours of Le Mans results

References

External links

Johnny Unser at ChampCarStats.com
1958 births American people of Swiss-German descent 24 Hours of Le Mans drivers 24 Hours of Daytona drivers Champ Car drivers Indianapolis 500 drivers IndyCar Series drivers Living people Sportspeople from Long Beach, California Racing drivers from California Unser family {{US-autoracing-bio-stub Dale Coyne Racing drivers