PARSONS KNEW NOLEN’S 20 WAS SPECIAL IN FIRST RIDE
By: Richie Murray - USAC Media
Speedway, Indiana (April 16, 2020)………When Johnny Parsons got behind the wheel of Gene Nolen’s USAC Silver Crown car for the first time, he knew the yellow No. 20 with the unique V-6 engine under the hood was a ride he wanted to be in for a long time.
“He was a great guy, a good guy to work with,” Parsons said of Nolen, who passed away at the age of 77 on April 8. “He had some good ideas. When I first got in the car at Springfield (in 1989), he said ‘I just raised the car up a little bit. I wanted to try and see if it got some sidebite. I came in after hot laps thinking ‘boy, I want to start driving that car all the time. And I ended up driving for him for quite a while and had a good time.”
Johnny Parsons is this Thursday’s guest on episode nine of USAC’s Thunder Relived on April 16, 8pm Eastern on FloRacing at https://bit.ly/3dzkF8Y.
After starting 2nd and finishing 2nd with eight laps led during that 1989 Springfield race, it was nearly another year before Parsons got his chance with Nolen again, becoming the team’s full-time driver between 1990 and 1993 and notching two victories.
Parsons is a decorated veteran of auto racing for over four decades, competing against the likes of A.J. Foyt and Mario Andretti in the 1960s all the way to the likes of Dave Darland and Tracy Hines in the late 2000s.
Although Parsons scored 30 USAC National Midget victories as well as five USAC National Sprint Car wins throughout his career and was one of the longest-tenured veterans of the Silver Crown series entering the 1991 season with 20 years of experience under his belt, his long-awaited first Crown victory had eluded him for two decades.
This Thursday night’s newest episode of Thunder Relived will have Parsons, a veteran of 12 Indianapolis 500 starts and two top-five finishes in the Greatest Spectacle in Racing, revisiting and recapping his breakthrough first career USAC Silver Crown win as a driver, which also happened to be the first series win by Nolen as a team owner, at Indianapolis Raceway Park on June 29, 1991.
“We were pretty elated,” Parsons remembered. “It was a neat deal. Before that race, we had been leading at Du Quoin and lost a driveshaft. We dropped out at the Indiana State Fairgrounds. We had a bad run of luck. Gene worked really hard as did Bill Tranter, the mechanic on it, and the guys all worked together. It was a good team with a good bunch of people, and I think we’re still going to see the car come back without Gene in memory of him (in 2020). (He was a) great guy.”
Parsons also speaks of his upbringing to becoming a racing star, holding such jobs as a forklift operator and an officer for the Los Angeles Police Department before moving onto a four-decade career as a full-time USAC National series driver.
Thursday's Thunder Relived episode featuring Parsons will precede round three of the 2020 AMSOIL USAC iRacing Challenge presented by NOS Energy Drink Midget race from Williams Grove Speedway at 9pm ET on FloRacing. The event will feature the stars of USAC Racing competing against one another in the world’s leading motorsports simulation weekly each Thursday night throughout the month of April.
Thunder Relived promises to take you under the helmet and in-depth with USAC personalities past and present as we revisit all the thrills, spills and the greatest moments from USAC’s vast Sprint, Midget and Silver Crown video vault. Stay tuned for more information regarding Thunder Relived on USAC’s website at www.usacracing.com, our social media channels at www.facebook.com/usacracing, www.twitter.com/usacnation and on Instagram @usacnation.