Speeding with Mario Andretti
When the globally iconic race car driver came to Pittsburgh in 1996 to do PR for a Toyota dealership he bought, I got to give him a backseat tour of the city as he drove its infamously bad roads.
Of the many rich, famous, smart and accomplished people I was lucky to meet because I was a newspaper journalist, one of the nicest — and most likeable — was race car driver Mario Andretti.
When I spent a couple of hours with him as he drove me around Pittsburgh, I deliberately directed him to take a road that was a well-known speed trap.
I was secretly hoping he’d get stopped for speeding and the township cop would say, “Who do you think you are, pal? Mario Andretti?”
This feature article I wrote for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette is one of my favorites.
Motorist Andretti cools it — mostly
By Bill Steigerwald
Aug.3, 1996
We're in the fast lane, going like 60.
We're tooling down the Parkway West, headed for Downtown Pittsburgh in a virginal white 1996 Toyota Celica.
Traffic is annoyingly thick for lunch hour and we're coming up kind of fast on a sluggish 1980-something sedan. But my driver — a down-to-earth millionaire with a slight Italian accent and three fingertips of his left hand dangling casually from the 7 o'clock position on the steering wheel — seems to know what he's doing.
He ought to. The sockless 56-year-old grandfather with the Revo sunglasses, the gold 1969 Indy 500 ring and the slightly heavy right foot is no ordinary wheel man. In fact, he's a living, breathing encyclopedia entry.
As in Mario Andretti.
As in the Mario Andretti, the just-recently retired iconic superstar American race car driver whose digitized bio can now be found in the Microsoft Encarta Encyclopedia:
ANDRETTI, MARIO GABRIEL (1940-), American professional automobile racer, winner of more than 50 Indy Car races, the Indianapolis 500 and the World Grand Prix Formula One championship. Recognized as one of the most successful and versatile drivers in automobile racing history, he was also one of the most popular figures in sport.
Andretti flew into town Thursday in his four-engine private jet to host today's official opening of Andretti Toyota, the Beers School Road dealership he recently bought in Coraopolis.
As part of his promotional duties, he agreed to let a reporter give him a quick tour of Pittsburgh. It would also give him a chance to compare drivers here with those he's encountered in dozens of other cities, from Los Angeles and Paris to Buenos Aires.
The best drivers are in Europe," he was saying as the sluggish 1980-something sedan grew ever larger in our front windshield. "Paris, Rome, London, almost in that sequence, believe it or not.
"The worst drivers in the world are in Miami. Unbelievable, unbelievable. It's so disorganized. There's something there, I don't know if it's the ethnic mix or what. But it's the most disorganized traffic patterns I've ever seen."
“Um. Excuse me, Mario," say I, the ultimate backseat driver, perhaps because I am actually sitting in the backseat. "You're not following this guy too closely, are you?"
“No. Not at this speed."
"What speed?"
"57."
"OK, sorry. 'Cause all the high school books tell you... and, ah, that's only about 2, 2 1/2 car lengths there."
"I think I'm doing all right," he says, sounding the teeniest bit defensive, which, as a living encyclopedia entry, he has every right to be.
Andretti maintains his distance behind the sedan. As we hum toward the Carnegie exit, he delivers a gentle sermon about why he doesn't like speed-limit-going American drivers who clog up the fast lane.
In a friendly, low-key and down to-earth way, he refers to these self-righteous American road blocks as "road vigilantes."
Unlike Europeans, who will quickly move to the slow lane when a speeding car with blinking headlights appears on their tail, road vigilantes won't budge. Andretti thinks considerate drivers stay to the right on two- or three-lane highways whenever possible.
"If those right-hand lanes are congested, fair enough," he says, turning his head to look at his passenger.
"But if they're not, that's where you should be, because there's always somebody else who's going to want to be faster. Whether he's speeding or not — that's his business, not yours."
Just then, as if by a miracle, the Parkway West traffic parts. The sluggish 1980-something sedan has vaporized.
But Father Mario, instead of letting the Celica's engine rip, shows that he practices the speed-and-let-speed gospel he preaches.
"As soon as it opens up like this," he says, looking in his rear view mirror, "I think you should just go over — because there's a guy right behind me who's going pass me."
Sure enough, a red four-door Chevy had suddenly come up on our tail.
"See," Andretti says cheerfully as he puts on his turn signal and smoothly moves over, "and I'm doing 60 miles an hour."
The Chevy had no idea he had just blown the doors off Mario Andretti. But Super Mario doesn't care. It's common for drivers to recognize him on the highway and want to pass him. He usually moves over and gives them a cheap thrill.
Otherwise, he says, "If I would insist, like an idiot, to race the guy, then we've got a problem, and obviously, I become an idiot like he is."
Just as we pass the Green Tree exit on the Parkway, we are greeted with something even a Mario Andretti can't do much about — the permanent traffic jam on the inbound slope of the Green Tree hill.
As we descend toward the Fort Pitt Tunnels, Andretti shows no frustration at the slow pace.
He tells stories about his unhappy financial adventure with O.J. Simpson and talks about his new California winery in Napa Valley. And he even admits that he likes mass transit and declares that women no longer deserve their old stereotype as lousy drivers.
Andretti, who doesn't slow down the way many Pittsburghers do when we cruise through the tunnel, is greatly impressed by what he sees when he emerges from the other end.
"This is a beautiful way to approach the city," he says as Pittsburgh and its skyline explode into view.
"Mario, you want to get in that left lane there. Not the far left, just one lane over. Then just go straight."
"This is the very first time that I've come this way."
"There's Three Rivers Stadium over there. OK, Mario, bear to your right here and follow the Boulevard of the Allies sign."
It isn't long before we are in Oakland, gliding past Pitt's Cathedral of Learning as we take advantage of Fifth Avenue's fabulously synchronized traffic lights, a rare local driving pleasure you don't have to be a world-famous race car driver to appreciate.
As Andretti is talking about how happy he was to see the end of the old 55-mph maximum speed limit, the accident almost happens.
"Let's be honest," he is saying as he approaches the tricky left-turn off Fifth onto Craft Avenue that feeds traffic onto Forbes Avenue and then to the ramp to the Parkway East.
"Who was really driving 55? My mother doesn't drive 55. So why have a law that is not going to be obeyed?"
"You're OK, Mario. You're going to turn left here, and then you're going to have to make a quick right."
"It never really, honestly worked. Now if you go back up to 65, I think that's a lot more reasonable. I..."
"BEEEEPPPPPP!!!"
We come within inches of sideswiping a Jeep Cherokee that was in his blind spot.
"Sorry, Mario."
"She was right," Andretti says, realizing that he has to switch lanes quickly.
“You need to go right but you can't, Mario."
"I will."
Thirty minutes later, Andretti's 90-minute Tour de Pittsburgh is over and all the traffic jams, unsynchronized traffic signals and pot holes are behind him.
On the basis of his observations, he says, Pittsburgh's drivers are in pretty good shape.
Thanks mostly to a series of badly timed directions from his local guide, which he was more than willing to take, Andretti had parked illegally twice, made two illegal left turns and almost gotten in two minor fender-benders.
On his way back to the Airport via Route 65, he jackrabbited away from a few red lights and went 60 in a 40 mph zone in Bellevue.
Otherwise, everyone should know that Andretti — who may speed now and again but will never commit the mortal sin of driving recklessly — drove like a priest, not a guy whose lifetime average driving speed is probably somewhere around 143 mph.
And, as further proof that he is specially blessed when he is behind the wheel, Andretti successfully made it through the infamous Kilbuck Township speed trap on Route 65 without getting a ticket.
It wouldn't have been his first speeding ticket. He's been stopped by the cops plenty of times. But as he says, it's an event that usually results in many more laughs than citations.