Pat O'Connor

9/10/1928 - 30/5/1958

Record updated 08-Oct-06

Pat O'Connor took part to forty three champ car races, scoring two wins, at Darlington in a 200 mile race in 1956 and at Trenton in a 100 mile race in 1957. He took two poles, including one at the Indy 500 in 1957. He was killed in the 1958 Indy 500.

Pat O'Connor
Pat O'Connor took part to forty three champ car races, scoring two wins, at Darlington in a 200 mile race in 1956 and at Trenton in a 100 mile race in 1957. He took two poles, including one at the Indy 500 in 1957.

When he returned to the Brickyard the following year he was one of the favourites. Unfortunately the start of the 1958 Indy 500 ,which had Dick Rathmann, Ed Elisian and Jimmy Reece on the front row and O'Connor behind them, was chaotic. The pace car did not speed up which caused the need for a second pace lap. In the ensuing confusion the race started with Rathmann and Elisian going wheel to wheel in the first two turns. In Turn 3 Elisian spun and hit Rathmann sending him into the wall and causing a fifteen car pile-up. Pat O'Connor's Sumar rolled and took fire and O'Connor died instantly from a skull fracture. Elisian was suspended by USAC for going into the turn too fast. He died a year later at Milwaukee.

O'Connor was married and had an eighteen-month son.

1956 - Indycars: 1 win (Darlington)
1957 - Indycars: 1 win (Trenton)



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